Sebastian Haffner
Abschied ('Parting')
Paris, spring of 1931: a young man stands on the banks of the Seine, a parting is imminent. Raimund gazes over the city and at his girlfriend Teddy, who came to France to study and to enjoy the freedom of the French capital, and whom he will maybe never see again. If he could only stop the future! They cram an entire era between being carefree and saying goodbye, between spring in the air and an inkling of the darkness to come. These are the months of the Weimar Republic's last gasps of breath before freedom is silenced.
Alexander Scheer gives the language of the 24-year-old a voice that seems to float between memories and the present. Filled with the courage to feel, the beauty and the melancholy of saying goodbye; this is a bright and clear-sighted book that is about love, truth and a breaking world.
It took Raimund Pretzel only a short time to write Parting in 1932. The author did not choose the pseudonym Sebastian Haffner, inspired by Bach's first name and Mozart's symphony Haffner, until he went into exile and moved to Britain in 1938. He returned to Germany in 1954 and became an influential journalist in the 'Bonn Republic', as the Federal Republic of Germany was sometimes called between 1949 to 1990 (analogue to the Weimar Republic). His novel was later discovered amongst his papers after his death and was not published until 2025, almost one hundred years after it had been written.
Alexander Scheer is at home in the theatre, in films and on music stages. His career began with the film Sun Alley around 25 years ago. He is now considered one of the most influential German film actors and captivates with his intense and versatile portrayals. He was celebrated for his performances in Andreas Dresen's films, such as the starring role in Gundermann and his role as a lawyer in Rabiye Kurnaz vs. George W. Bush. Besides engagements in Berlin, Hamburg, Vienna and Frankfurt, he remains close to the theatre and was a member of the Berliner Volksbühne cast under Frank Castorf for many years. He can also regularly be experienced live as a singer and guitarist, currently with his David Bowie programme Heroes.
