The Magic of the West. An Experience
For Michael Schindhelm, like all citizens of the GDR before 1989, Western reality, from the outside, had the character of the virtual, only borne into the East via television. Paradise was within sight – and yet beyond reach. Then the new reality burst forth; paradise opened its gates, and everything was different than expected. Still initially transfixed by the magic of the West, one quickly became disillusioned, in an unprecedented pendulum of emotions. Everything one knew was fragile, everything expected failed to turn out. Michael Schindhelm, now a theater director in Basel, describes his thoroughly personal experience with this new reality: the road from an exterior to an interior view, a highly fascinating metamorphosis of one’s perception of oneself and the world.
Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt (DVA), Stuttgart 2001
ISBN 978-3-421-05442-5
Hardcover, 208 pages
Available on Amazon.