All of this takes place in the attic of Evelyn's house, which supposedly represents Evelyn's psyche. This edition includes several personal memoirs by German-born children whose lives were saved, and transformed, by the Kindertransport.

In this author’s guide to the play, Diane Samuels investigates the historical background, drawing on the personal testimony of those whose lives were transformed by the Kindertransport. At the same time in the present, Evelyn's daughter Faith is uncovering her mother's secret past and they have an argument, which eventually comes to rest.

The play tells the story of how nine-year-old Eva, a German Jewish girl, is sent by her parents on the Kindertransport to start a new life with a foster family in Britain just before the outbreak of World War Two. And she presents detailed accounts from the actors, directors, a composer and designer who have contributed to the play’s most notable productions. Eva is at a Manchester train station waiting for her parents, who promised they would secure their visas and reunite with Eva in England, when a station guard approaches her. Through flashbacks, the play presents the hardships faced by Eva, a nine-year-old child sent on a Kindertransport and taken in by a British family. Eva’s imagination transforms the official (and most other authority figures) into the Ratcatcher, a mythical villain from a children’s book Helga used to read to Eva.

He interrogates her in English and is visibly annoyed when Eva responds in German, the only language she understands. Helga and Werner Schlesinger are parents faced with the difficult choice of keeping their beloved daughter Eva in Germany with them, or letting her become one of the Kindertransport children, who are sent to the UK, alone. Spared the horrors of the death camps, the Jewish "Kinder" were uprooted, separated from their parents and transported to a different culture where they faced, not the unmitigated horror of the death camps, but a very human mixture of kindness, indifference, occasional exploitation, and the selflessness of ordinary people faced with needy children. Between 1939 until the outbreak of World War II, nearly 10,000 Jewish children were taken from their families in Nazi-occupied Germany and sent to live with foster families in Britain.

Kindertransport is based on the experiences of children who were allowed to leave Nazi Germany for England in 1938/39 and who were separated from their families, many of whom perished during the Holocaust. by Robert Skloot 2022 NJTF HTII Lifetime Achievement Award AHO Winter Conference, Miami, FL I’d like to begin my remarks by asking the question that all of us have been asked often: “Why do you do the work you do? Brutally separated from her German Jewish parents at the age of nine, Eva is brought to England with the promise of a new life. Kindertransport is a play by Diane Samuels, which examines the life, during World War II and afterwards, of a Kindertransport child. When Evelyn was nine, her mother Helga sent her to live in England to keep her safe from Nazi persecution.

Also available: Diane Samuels' Kindertransport: The author's guide to the play, invaluable for anyone studying, teaching or performing the play. Lil allows Eva to smoke when she meets her which shows how Lil is not a proper guardian for Eva at first. One day Helga arrives when Eva is in her late teens and Eva tells Helga that Lil and Jack have adopted her and she has been naturalised as English, and her name is now Evelyn. Eva and Lil fall out as Eva skips her English lessons to go and ask round rich houses if they will give her parents jobs; Lil thinks this makes her seem desperate.Kindertransport was first performed in the UK by the Soho Theatre Company at the Cockpit Theatre, Marylebone, in London on 13 April 1993 and in the US at the Manhattan Theatre Club in New York on 26 April 1994. These pioneering techniques are found in Enacting History: A Practical Guide to Teaching the Holocaust through Theater published by Routledge Press. Kindertransport depicts the agony of separating a child from her parents and wrestles with the consequences of that choice, an act of sacrifice that also wreaks devastating results. The play enjoyed a season in London's West End, playing at the Vaudeville Theatre from 9 September to 30 November 1996.

When her own daughter discovers some old letters and photos in the attic, she is forced to confront the truth about who she really is and to reveal a dark secret that she has done everything to keep hidden.

The play jumps back and forth between three time periods: 1) Pre-war - in which Helga tries to prepare Eva to leave her home and parents; 2) War - in which Eva is living in England with Lil, adjusting to a new country, and desperately trying to get her parents out of Germany; and 3) Post-war, in which Eva (who has now changed her name to Evelyn) is an adult, has a daughter named Faith, and has intentionally wiped most of her past and her Jewishness out of existence. It's a refreshing change for a study guide to come from the pen of the person who created the text being studied. Eva Schlesinger, daughter of Helga and Werner, is sent away to live with a foster carer in Manchester, England, temporarily until her parents find work and move to England too. Set Text: Kindertransport is a set text for GCSE English Literature (AQA) and AS/A-Level English Literature (WJEC). This includes Remembrance Readings of plays from the Holocaust Theater Catalog done by numerous organizations led by Theaters, Museums, Universities, Artists and Educators.