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Kindertransport
The best play about the pain and passion of mother/daughter relationships.-- Guardian.
96 pages, Paperback
First published April 1, 2000
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159 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 57 reviews
March 10, 2013
If I could give it 0 stars, I probably would. The first half page is promising, from which point it starts to disintegrate. No plot, the temporal shifts are simply irritating, and the symbolism is so obvious and shallow it borders on offensive to ones intellect.
February 9, 2018
'The older I get the less of myself I become.'
Really enjoyed reading this play, it's historical themes and atmosphere were executed very well.
Really enjoyed reading this play, it's historical themes and atmosphere were executed very well.
November 4, 2019
I enjoyed reading a play for a change. Through the script, many different facts were told, emotions were shared and a sense of the impact of the situation of the Kindertransport was gained.
September 17, 2024
Few books have made me nearly cry. This got me damn close.
Kindertransport is a play based on the true accounts from the final trains carrying Jewish children out of Germany before WWII began. And it just rips at the heartstrings with honestly the most devastating revelations and penny-drop moments.
It’s a confusing play, mixing the past with the present as a mother prepares to say goodbye before her adult daughter ‘leaves the nest’ in post-war Britain. But my god I can’t stress enough how hard this play hits you.
The lingering trauma, mixed in with flashbacks and uncomfortable conversations between two generations after the war all combine to make this play so poignant and moving. I’m very glad I read it.
Kindertransport is a play based on the true accounts from the final trains carrying Jewish children out of Germany before WWII began. And it just rips at the heartstrings with honestly the most devastating revelations and penny-drop moments.
It’s a confusing play, mixing the past with the present as a mother prepares to say goodbye before her adult daughter ‘leaves the nest’ in post-war Britain. But my god I can’t stress enough how hard this play hits you.
The lingering trauma, mixed in with flashbacks and uncomfortable conversations between two generations after the war all combine to make this play so poignant and moving. I’m very glad I read it.
March 13, 2019
Moved - and flummoxed - hard to review, but I will try
It is quite different, on so many levels, reading a play rather than reading a book. The underlying sadness of this play comes through in the dialogue, that is wonderful, of course, an achievement. Even without watching the play or feeling a connection to the cast, I know I am not alone in feeling and thinking that all plays, from Shakespeare to Pinter, and everything past and future are meant to be performed not flat dialogue on a page which can't create the power of performance.
This is quite, to my surprise, a short play. I also can't help feeling rightly or wrongly - probably wrongly - the subject could have been tackled a myriad of ways. It felt a little disappointing, not the story perhaps, given the title, I was expecting. It felt more about survivor 's guilt than the story of The Kindertransport. But that is more to do with my response to the play than the play itself.
The facts and background that introduces the play was profoundly moving and thought provoking. Perhaps I need to reserve my opinion of the play until I have seen the production.
I was asked ,after joining my local theatre press team, to write a preview for the theatre's newspaper for the play which is currently in rehearsal. I haven't yet seen a rehearsal - but I will sit in on several, and speak to the cast and director before writing the preview. I also have tickets and will be taking my grand daughters. I have read a lot of books about the holocaust, but the theme or themes in this play are a new way of looking for me and will be thought provoking. For now, just to say, that though a short read, it's left me slightly reeling. But, as always, it's the younger and next generations who will make sense of the past. Thank goodness for the addition of the character of Faith to make sense of heritage and history. Maybe it could have been longer, I would have liked it to be. But the message gets across and left me with a sense of past and future. In the light of more recent history current events, it's a great play to be performed right now again. The message doesn't dim or date.
It is quite different, on so many levels, reading a play rather than reading a book. The underlying sadness of this play comes through in the dialogue, that is wonderful, of course, an achievement. Even without watching the play or feeling a connection to the cast, I know I am not alone in feeling and thinking that all plays, from Shakespeare to Pinter, and everything past and future are meant to be performed not flat dialogue on a page which can't create the power of performance.
This is quite, to my surprise, a short play. I also can't help feeling rightly or wrongly - probably wrongly - the subject could have been tackled a myriad of ways. It felt a little disappointing, not the story perhaps, given the title, I was expecting. It felt more about survivor 's guilt than the story of The Kindertransport. But that is more to do with my response to the play than the play itself.
The facts and background that introduces the play was profoundly moving and thought provoking. Perhaps I need to reserve my opinion of the play until I have seen the production.
I was asked ,after joining my local theatre press team, to write a preview for the theatre's newspaper for the play which is currently in rehearsal. I haven't yet seen a rehearsal - but I will sit in on several, and speak to the cast and director before writing the preview. I also have tickets and will be taking my grand daughters. I have read a lot of books about the holocaust, but the theme or themes in this play are a new way of looking for me and will be thought provoking. For now, just to say, that though a short read, it's left me slightly reeling. But, as always, it's the younger and next generations who will make sense of the past. Thank goodness for the addition of the character of Faith to make sense of heritage and history. Maybe it could have been longer, I would have liked it to be. But the message gets across and left me with a sense of past and future. In the light of more recent history current events, it's a great play to be performed right now again. The message doesn't dim or date.
August 22, 2015
I saw this play several years ago and utterly loved it. Today, I reread the script and was struck again by how poignantly Samuels writes about a child being separated from her parents. The beauty of this play is that the consequences of the forced separation (though it was done through love) can be seen in multiple generations. This plays asks questions that are well worth asking, and it does so with wonderfully written characters that reach out and grab your heartstrings.
December 8, 2023
The author took several stories of people who traveled via the Kindertrasnsport and wove them into a play which shifted from the characters during 1939 and the present. The connection between mother and daughter is universal.
February 2, 2017
3.5 stars.
Let me just say this: it was worth the read. I think most people should read this play. Kindertransport is about the ups and downs of mother-daughter relationships. The emotions of the characters were SO overwhelming - it taught me a lot about human nature as a whole.
The beginning was a bit slow and I wanted to stop reading at one point, but I'm glad I kept going. The two interwoven story lines were choppy, and I was confused at times. However, I took a lot away from this play. I'm trying not to give away anything, but I will say that it was quite predictable. Still, Kindertransport is very different from everything else I've read. Many of the Holocaust books are extremely similar, but this one is so unique. I've never even heard about the Kindertransport system!
If you are on the fence about giving this play a chance, read it. It's short anyway, so if you don't like it you won't be as bitter. This was definitely worth my time to read, I learned a lot.
Let me just say this: it was worth the read. I think most people should read this play. Kindertransport is about the ups and downs of mother-daughter relationships. The emotions of the characters were SO overwhelming - it taught me a lot about human nature as a whole.
The beginning was a bit slow and I wanted to stop reading at one point, but I'm glad I kept going. The two interwoven story lines were choppy, and I was confused at times. However, I took a lot away from this play. I'm trying not to give away anything, but I will say that it was quite predictable. Still, Kindertransport is very different from everything else I've read. Many of the Holocaust books are extremely similar, but this one is so unique. I've never even heard about the Kindertransport system!
If you are on the fence about giving this play a chance, read it. It's short anyway, so if you don't like it you won't be as bitter. This was definitely worth my time to read, I learned a lot.
July 18, 2023
I listened to the audioplay from LA Theatre Works of Kindertransport, and it was well worth the read. The cast gave moving performances, and it's a devastating story that all too many people experienced in reality. I liked the way it addressed the antisemitism against and the forced assimilation of the children who left Germany. The narrative was a little disjointed, and I feel like jumping back and forth through time just didn't really translate to an audioplay very well, leaving me feeling a bit of whiplash trying to transition in the timeline. Despite this, I thought it was an enlightening and moving take on something profoundly difficult. I really loved that the audio version had an interview at the end with a woman who survived the Holocaust as a result of the Kindertransport as she shared her experiences and the experiences of others she knew and commented a little on the play. Overall, this was worth listening to.
September 13, 2021
The book was very interesting for me, first of all because it was a trigger to learn more about historical events that were unknown to me (the story of the Jewish children sent away by their parents to escape a fate that many of them saw coming). I also appreciated the literary way that Diane Samuels approached in telling her own story based on these events and the deep sentimental impact these had on her personally as a parent (and to which any parent such as myself can relate). I found the mixing of sequences in the temporal dimension (or indeed, as the author herself puts it, to see the story as a 'continuum' instead of a sequence) to be a novel and powerful way of delivering the play. Having read the book, I am now looking to watch the theatrical play itself one day.
August 18, 2024
LATW version. A play set during the campaign to save children just before the outbreak of WWII; we follow a girl's journey from her home in Germany to her new family in England. This could easily have been a schmaltzfest, but takes a much stronger turn dealing not only with alienation in a new country, but the abandonment of the old. Eva's reactions aren't the neat drama staples, but the awkward ambiguous ones collected from real life events that inspired the story. Her rejection of her old identity and creation of a new one is set in contrast with her own child's need to find out who she is through uncovering the past - a past Eva's decided to bury. This is a much less popular first and second generation immigrant story.
Good performances.
Good performances.
March 22, 2020
Interesting idea for a play, great work for an almost-all-female cast, and a fantastic penultimate scene, but other than that I was like meh. There is a strong idea here; I guess I just was unimpressed by the execution. There's an allusion to the pied piper fable. It felt cliche until the end. Having it flipped and both mother and daughter being compared to the rat-catcher rather than the circumstances imposed by the Nazis was a clever inversion. I just wanted to like the play as a whole as much as I like the writing in that final scene.
March 14, 2022
Kindertransport is such a bad book. I feel as though it is quite random and the transition between scenes and flashbacks and flash forwards are terrible. The book/ play in general seems quite unstable with an unclear aim. I hate the characters as they all constantly yell at each fixated on their own views. At least if Diane Samuels had made it an emotional ending it would have been better and easier to connect with. However the ending feels unresolved and does not even make me curious to what could happen next but makes glad it is over.
May 6, 2018
Really impressed by how this play managed to sensitively and efficiently span such a range of themes and emotions, while avoiding the trap of idealising characters because of their circumstances and experiences. All of the characters were fairly awful in the way they treated each other, but this was necessary to demonstrate the impossible and unthinkable choices that people face as a result of war. I wish I could see it being performed.
December 14, 2018
I found it hard to be able to focus on the actual story simply because of the book's layout as it's set as a play. I also feel like the story itself could've been a bit more developed so that such an interesting period of history could also have a more interesting story where the main character wasn't so 2dimensional I feel like there were hints of 3d characterization but it wasn't enough. All in all something was missing.
March 1, 2020
Das englische Buch ist als Theaterstück aufgebaut und erzählt die Geschichte von Eva/Evelyn, die in den Kindertransport vor dem 2. Weltkrieg involviert war. Vor der Unterrichtseinheit wusste ich gar nicht, dass England rund 10.000 Kinder aus Europa vor den Greueltaten des NS-Regimes "gerettet" hat.
Das Cover finde ich jetzt nicht unbedingt schön, aber unheimlich ernst und aussagekräftig, was dem Werk auf jeden Fall gerecht wird. Der Schreibstil war gut zu lesen, die Dialoge und stage instructions verständlich und kein hochtrabendes Englisch wurde gebraucht. Das Stück ist in zwei Handlungen aufgebaut, die sporadisch sogar parallel auf der Bühne geschauspielert werden. Das hat den Einstieg etwas erschwert, da man sich erst über die Verhältnisse und Handlungstränge klar werden musste, bevor man sich zurechtfand. Lang dauerte das aber nicht und so kam ich ziemlich gut durch die gerade mal 96 Seiten.
Sofort war klar, dass der reine Text des Dramas bloß die Spitze des Eisbergs ist und zwischen den Zeilen unendlich viel Symbolik und Information steckt, die der Leser eben selbst erfassen muss. Das war mal erfrischend und man konnte viel interpretieren! Generell fand ich die gewählte Darstellungsform total gut für so ein wichtiges Thema! Hochemotionale Wendepunkte, der ständige Wechsel bzw das Nebeneinander von Vergangenheit und Gegenwart und dann noch die vielen Parallelen zwischen den Handlungssträngen - unfassbar gut gemacht. Man merkt einfach, wie viele Gedanken dahinterstecken, dass jede Requisite, jede Hintergrundmusik, jede Regieanweisung und jedes Wort essentiell wichtig für die Handlung ist. In dieser Ausgabe waren vorn Texte über persönliche, reale Erfahrungen von zahlreichen "Kindern" des Kindertransports. Jedes von ihnen ereilte ein anderes Schicksal und jeder ging anders mit dieser einschneidenden Erfahrung um, so spannend! Und diese ganze Lektüre handelt im Grunde auch von dem Verarbeitungsprozess der Protagonistin, die von der kleinen deutschen Eva zur englischen Mutter Evelyn wurde, sich in diese neue Identität flüchtete und alles Vergangene versucht zu verdrängen und verheimlichen, selbst vor ihrer Tochter Faith. Als diese bei Vorbereitungen für ihren Auszug jedoch Indizien zu der Vergangenheit ihrer Mutter fand, kam das wohlbehütete Geheimnis ans Licht, und plötzlich sieht sich Evelyn wieder konfrontiert mit den altem Erinnerungen. In vier Akten erfahren wir dann Stück für Stück immer mehr über ihre Lebensgeschichte und dass diese wohlgemeinte Rettungsaktion zwar viele Leben schenkte, doch auch unheilbare Wunden hinterließ.
Insgesamt hat mir auch diese letzte Schullektüre im Englisch Leistungskurs wieder gut gefallen, die ein absolut wichtiges Thema behandelt. Sie erzählt eine fiktive Geschichte und dabei tausende reale Schicksale! Auch hier konnte ich meinen Lesehorizont wieder erweitern. Zeitweise waren die Dialoge schwer zu deuten und die plötzlichen Zeitsprünge verwirrend, man sollte es also im wachen Zustand lesen! Ich würde mir auf jeden Fall gerne mal die Bühnenversion anschauen, man kann das so unterschiedlich darstellen!
✒Lieblingssatz: "Evelyn: 'A chipped glass is ruined forever.'" (Diese Symbolik, gosh!)
Deshalb 7/10🌟 Sternen, Standard für Schullektüren
Das Cover finde ich jetzt nicht unbedingt schön, aber unheimlich ernst und aussagekräftig, was dem Werk auf jeden Fall gerecht wird. Der Schreibstil war gut zu lesen, die Dialoge und stage instructions verständlich und kein hochtrabendes Englisch wurde gebraucht. Das Stück ist in zwei Handlungen aufgebaut, die sporadisch sogar parallel auf der Bühne geschauspielert werden. Das hat den Einstieg etwas erschwert, da man sich erst über die Verhältnisse und Handlungstränge klar werden musste, bevor man sich zurechtfand. Lang dauerte das aber nicht und so kam ich ziemlich gut durch die gerade mal 96 Seiten.
Sofort war klar, dass der reine Text des Dramas bloß die Spitze des Eisbergs ist und zwischen den Zeilen unendlich viel Symbolik und Information steckt, die der Leser eben selbst erfassen muss. Das war mal erfrischend und man konnte viel interpretieren! Generell fand ich die gewählte Darstellungsform total gut für so ein wichtiges Thema! Hochemotionale Wendepunkte, der ständige Wechsel bzw das Nebeneinander von Vergangenheit und Gegenwart und dann noch die vielen Parallelen zwischen den Handlungssträngen - unfassbar gut gemacht. Man merkt einfach, wie viele Gedanken dahinterstecken, dass jede Requisite, jede Hintergrundmusik, jede Regieanweisung und jedes Wort essentiell wichtig für die Handlung ist. In dieser Ausgabe waren vorn Texte über persönliche, reale Erfahrungen von zahlreichen "Kindern" des Kindertransports. Jedes von ihnen ereilte ein anderes Schicksal und jeder ging anders mit dieser einschneidenden Erfahrung um, so spannend! Und diese ganze Lektüre handelt im Grunde auch von dem Verarbeitungsprozess der Protagonistin, die von der kleinen deutschen Eva zur englischen Mutter Evelyn wurde, sich in diese neue Identität flüchtete und alles Vergangene versucht zu verdrängen und verheimlichen, selbst vor ihrer Tochter Faith. Als diese bei Vorbereitungen für ihren Auszug jedoch Indizien zu der Vergangenheit ihrer Mutter fand, kam das wohlbehütete Geheimnis ans Licht, und plötzlich sieht sich Evelyn wieder konfrontiert mit den altem Erinnerungen. In vier Akten erfahren wir dann Stück für Stück immer mehr über ihre Lebensgeschichte und dass diese wohlgemeinte Rettungsaktion zwar viele Leben schenkte, doch auch unheilbare Wunden hinterließ.
Insgesamt hat mir auch diese letzte Schullektüre im Englisch Leistungskurs wieder gut gefallen, die ein absolut wichtiges Thema behandelt. Sie erzählt eine fiktive Geschichte und dabei tausende reale Schicksale! Auch hier konnte ich meinen Lesehorizont wieder erweitern. Zeitweise waren die Dialoge schwer zu deuten und die plötzlichen Zeitsprünge verwirrend, man sollte es also im wachen Zustand lesen! Ich würde mir auf jeden Fall gerne mal die Bühnenversion anschauen, man kann das so unterschiedlich darstellen!
✒Lieblingssatz: "Evelyn: 'A chipped glass is ruined forever.'" (Diese Symbolik, gosh!)
Deshalb 7/10🌟 Sternen, Standard für Schullektüren
February 12, 2019
I am stage managing this play for a local little theatre, which means that I've read the script a couple of dozen times already. The story is riveting and well-written. I can't wait to see what the audience thinks of it.
June 30, 2022
I enjoyed learning more about the psychological effects of Kindertransport- the play format was refreshing compared to reading through the conventional book or novel that typically discuss the effects of World War Two seriously.
March 6, 2024
Really powerful book that gives great insight into what went on during the war. It also features PTSD from the time which I think is great. Goes back and forth between different time periods which some might find confusing but I understood.
May 29, 2017
Sad and lonely play about loss, pain and survival.
September 9, 2017
An emotive account narrative between a mother and daughter just prior to the Second World War. Enjoyed it.
February 22, 2018
An absolutely fantastic play.
September 21, 2018
Enjoyed the historical aspect because was not familiar with the subject matter and liked the way the past and present intermingled. Worth reading.
November 5, 2018
I love the format that shows the past and present colliding in this book. I read this for my school's play, in which I played Helga.
April 27, 2020
Powerful. I'd have loved to see this play performed.
May 11, 2021
Again an Irish Leaving Certificate read for English - again very sad. Interesting and excellent.
March 3, 2022
Vwery pertinent at times like these.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 57 reviews