Burn My Words so Yours Can Live

5th May, 1933, Berlin

Remember the first time we met? That time on Opernplatz in a crowd? You coming out from the opera, wearing your black suit and your hair done up like that? Me wearing my brown shirt patrolling, my hair like that? I didn't know I was looking for you at the time, but I remember when our eyes met I thought: "Ah, there you are!"

You used tell me the story of the famous Library of Alexandria was burnt by the Arabs under the Khalif Omar in order to heat the water for their baths. With the fuel of all the ancient texts, all humanity had learned and written down since the beginning, their baths stayed warm for sixth months. You told me this a we sat in your bath, thinking the water would stay warm forever. The story is just a story though, the Library of Alexandria had been robbed of its beauty and importance long before and the books were already gone. Sort of how our love was already doomed from before we looked eyes at Opernplatz.

I think of this story we used to hear from stories, all those hours we used to spend at Alte Bibliothek when I tried to practice for my exams for my law degree, you finding inspiration of old writers for your new poetry. Now I fear that our libraries, our words and our world will disappear like the Library of Alexandria as well.

That time outside of the opera lingered in my head, replaying again and again as I walked up and down Unt er den Linden boulevard in hopes to see you again. Finally I found you on the bench, sitting with your journal, cold as dusk took over day. You looked up and saw me, closing your book and standing up.

"I've been waiting for ages, let's have a drink!"

As I walked side by side with you under the linden trees, when you took me to Eldorado bar on Motzstraße for a drink, when you invited me into your home, to your bed to your life, I loved you, and I really thought that our love would be our lives, although the world around us turned dark. You were my light, although I ended up being your dark.

I know it's been a while since we spoke, and I don't known if you have seen the lists coming from our offices. On April 8, 1933, the Main Office for Press and Propaganda of the German Student Union came with a proclamation they called an action against the Un-German Spirit. Some thought it was just a piece of paper, but I am here to tell you the ideas will be put into life. There will be a purge, a cleansing, a Säuberung, by fire.

I know the last time we spoke the conversation ended in ugly words, words filled with hate and how disappointed you were I put on my brown shirt and went to work instead of staying with you.

I saw that the Eldorado had to close down. Strange to think about that not too long ago, we saw Marlene Dietrich perform there. Our friends putting on a show in dresses and high heels. A lot of spaces were we could be us closed down this year.

I would have been happy enough to stay inside, just the two of us, but you wanted the world. You didn't just want to survive, you wanted to live! The irony that the very opera you used to drag me to, you're no longer allowed in, but I am. Your words so much truer, honest and beautiful are put on the list of forbidden ones, but my clumsy and cowardly words written in codes and riddles are allowed.

The words of our doctors and poets, the truth we took for granted reality-- all gone in flames in a few days time. Because truth not aligning with the fear they want us to feel must go. The black-lists are many. It's Einstein, Karl Marx, Kafka, Freud... and a bit further down I found your name. Your love poems you said you wrote to me will be collected and thrown on a big pyre as they are deemed as a threat to our country. Most likely, I will light the fire as well like the command tells me to.

Your writing, the one thing that saved my life and gave it something good, are believed to be the one thing sending me to hell. Although I treasure it and would go to hell thousands of times for you, I regrettably know that I will never hold your hand down the street. For that, I am too scared.

We used to learn about book burnings as history in our lectures, didn't we? The burning of books and burying of scholars under China's Qin dynasty in order for the Emperor to stay on his throne, the destruction of the House of Wisdom during the Mongol siege of Baghdad in 1258, the destruction of Aztec codices by Itzcoatl in the 1430s, and the burning of Maya codices on the order of bishop Diego de Landa in 1562. Centuries and whole cultures gone up in flames. We talked about it as humanities barbaric past, something we had evolved from and happened far far away, not knowing that the ghost of our past was knocking on our door.

I fear that the words we didn't pay attention to from Heinrich Heine will be our prophesy and words written on the walls: "Where you burn books, you also burn people in the end."

Tomorrow, the German Student Union will attack the Institut für Sexualwissenschaft. I have heard that Magnus Hirschfeld has gone abroad and will be safe, but I don't know if you are still volunteering there and fear for your safety. Those attacking is not only after silencing opposing voices, they are after blood. Stay away from the building, the people and the world tomorrow and for the unforeseen future as well. Because after this, the world will not be the same.

I beg you to pack up your pen and leave the city before they start burning more than books. I will try to save a copy of your collection of poetry from the flames. It's not much I can offer, but as revenge for my meek and cowardly existence, take this letter and burn it as revenge.

Did you see what Helen Keller said in her letter to the students when she ended up on the list?

"You may burn my books and the books of the best minds in Europe, but the ideas those books contain have passed through millions of channels and will go on."

Although I know you think your written words means more than your life, I implore you to just this once, listen to my words of caution. Leave your words and save your life so that your words will not only be history, but a prophesy for the future as well. Burn my words so yours can live.

In the meantime, I will leave my heart on Opernplatz, swiping up the ashes of the burned books and try to remember them all, the words and wisdom they gave me in your voice as you read them out loud on the benches under the linden trees.

Afterwords:

On 10 May, 1933, blacklisted books was taken to the Obernplatz square by the State Opera in Berlin, and burned them. The book burnings took place in 34 university towns and cities. A few later, the second world war consumed Europe.

A total of over 25,000 volumes of so-called "un-German" books were burned, sending Germany into an era of uncompromising state censorship. It has since been known as 'a holocaust of books' and 'the bibliocaust.' Along with the books, the lives of queer, Jewish and those opposing the system persecuted.

After the war, together with the rest of Berlin was bombed and destroyed. Today, the square where the infamous bookburning was rebuilt and rebranded as Bebelplatz. It gives an idea of how people imagined a beautiful city almost 300 years ago, long before the dark ages. The Nazis desecrated the place with the burning of books, which is commemorated today by a memorial.

Surely, nothing like this would ever happen again...