Kindertransport (NHB Modern Plays)

Product Information

The play also focuses on the now assimilated and completely dislocated Eva’s alienation from her actual mother, a survivor of the Holocaust, and the discovery by Faith, Eva’s daughter, of her mother’s unspoken past. This includes Remembrance Readings of plays from the Holocaust Theater Catalog done by numerous organizations led by Theaters, Museums, Universities, Artists and Educators. When Evelyn was nine, her mother Helga sent her to live in England to keep her safe from Nazi persecution. Teresa Eyring Executive Director Theatre Communications Group (TCG) AHO Conference, Miami, FL TCG is a national organization for theatre, based in New York. 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?

This play is also available as an A4 Edition, offering spiral binding, a larger print size and additional space for notes.In 1939, at the start of the play’s earlier timeline, Helga sends her young daughter Eva to live in England. 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. Since it was first staged by the Soho Theatre Company in London in 1993, Diane Samuels’ Kindertransport has enjoyed huge success around the world, has been revived numerous times, and is widely studied in schools and colleges.

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. Also available: Diane Samuels' Kindertransport: The author's guide to the play, invaluable for anyone studying, teaching or performing the play. When Eva arrives in London, speaking no English, and feeling very much abandoned, she is taken under the wing of Lil Miller. 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. 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.Set Text: Kindertransport is a set text for GCSE English Literature (AQA) and AS/A-Level English Literature (WJEC). Brutally separated from her German Jewish parents at the age of nine, Eva is brought to England with the promise of a new life. And she presents detailed accounts from the actors, directors, a composer and designer who have contributed to the play’s most notable productions. A Message from Arnold Mittelman After a career in not-for-profit and commercial theater spanning more than 40 years I was honored in 2007 to found the National Jewish Theater / Foundation and in 2010 to assume leadership of its Holocaust Theater International. All of this takes place in the attic of Evelyn's house, which supposedly represents Evelyn's psyche.

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.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. These pioneering techniques are found in Enacting History: A Practical Guide to Teaching the Holocaust through Theater published by Routledge Press.