Snippets:

I have lived and worked in Hamburg for many years and am still finding out new things about the city…for example, I am often fascinated by the work that has to go into foundations where there is no solid stone base…and a lot of the city is built on and propped up by stilts…water, water everywhere!!

And now that I am writing a book about the city (working title: Hamburg in the Light of Bridges) I come across new things every day. The piece below is an excerpt from my manuscript prompted by a memorial mound in Eimsbuettel.

In 1821, Heine couldn’t have known what was going to happen under National Socialism, yet he feared the burning of books.

Heinrich Heine:

“Das war ein Vorspiel nur, dort wo man Bücher Verbrennt, verbrennt man auch am Ende Menchen.”

“That was only a prelude, because where books are burnt, people will, ultimately, be burnt.”

These words are taken from Heine’s tragedy, Almansor (1821) when a Spanish Moslem made this pronouncement during the burning of the Koran – by Catholics – on a funeral pyre.

In his wildest dreams he could never have imagined that this was to become a reality in his home country of Germany.

The burning of books is recounted, in relief, on the base of the Heine Statue in Rathausmarkt, Hamburg.