Kindertransport
(Published by Nick Hern Books, London 1995. Original production at the Cockpit Theatre in London)
On the one hand Kindertransport is a play about the Jewish girl Eva, who is sent to England on
the Kindertransport in 1938 in order to escape the Nazis. On the other hand it is a play about mothers
and daughters. There are two interlocking time levels in the play. The scenes from the past alternate
with scenes from the present and they seem to explain what happens in the present.
The first time level takes place from 1938 to 1946 and tells Eva's story: the last day with her mother,
her journey to England on the Kindertransport, and how she adapts to the new and different country.
The development of the relationship between her and her step mother Lil is depicted as well as her
struggle to preserve her German-Jewish identity in a non-Jewish country. In the end, she denies this
identity and even changes her name to Evelyn.
The other time level is set in recent times. It shows how Evelyn's daughter Faith is about to move out
and how she finds a box with her mother's belongings. These things reveal something about her mother's
past she did not know. A fight between Faith, Evelyn and Lil breaks out because Faith confronts her
mother with what she has found and wants to know the truth. She thinks that she has a right to know
who her mother really is. Lil on the other hand did not know that Evelyn had kept these things. She
had been convinced that with denying her old identity, Evelyn had destroyed everything connected to it.
Being confronted with her past and with accusations from her daughter and her mother Evelyn is forced
to confront herself with her past and to 'redefine' the relationship to her daughter and her mother.