Quote · Empire: World History
370. The First British Indians: Saving Jews In Nazi Germany (Ep 2)
Where this was said
The Weimar Years: Happiness Before the Storm
At 27:01 · chapter starts 24:58
The moment Catherine is strong enough after WWI, and the moment borders allow, she returns to Lena in Kassel. Through the 1920s — the era of Weimar Germany, of Babylon Berlin, of unprecedented same-sex visibility and cultural experimentation — Catherine and Lena live in what the former calls 'domestic bliss.' Dalrymple evokes the world of Cabaret and Babylon Berlin, noting how little this era of German openness is remembered now. Catherine describes them as 'happy little church mice,' wandering around and having the most wonderful time. It is a happiness that history is about to catastrophically curtail — but for a decade, they are simply content. [1] — Anita Anand "Through the 1920s, Catherine and Lena lived out their days in Kassel during the Weimar Republic's wild years — describing themselves as 'ha…" 26:49
Through the 1920s, Catherine and Lena lived out their days in Kassel during the Weimar Republic's wild years — describing themselves as 'happy little church mice.' It was the world of Cabaret, of same-sex visibility, of an unlikely freedom that was about to be catastrophically reversed.
When Hitler became chancellor in 1933 and the Nuremberg Laws stripped Jews of citizenship in 1935, Catherine — a brown-skinned Indian woman in a same-sex partnership in Prussia — simply stayed. She was invisible enough to survive and well-connected enough, through Lena, to be protected — for now.
