Stasiland

Question 1

In the GDR… (forms of control/surveillance)

Answer 1

“In the GDR, there was one Stasi officer or informant for every three people”

Question 2

It’s hard… (forms of control)

Answer 2

“It’s hard to live in a society if you can’t subordinate yourself to authority” - Julia

Question 3

The GDR forced… (forms of control)

Answer 3

“The GDR forced people into a position… either you are for us or an enemy” - some dark haired man

Question 4

When I… (persecution)

Answer 4

“When I got out of prison, I was basically no longer human.” - Miriam

Question 5

You could… (persecution)

Answer 5

“You could walk in thinking you were going to clear up an administrative quirk and suddenly find yourself in a room being interrogated by the Stasi.” - Miriam

Question 6

I became… (persecution)

Answer 6

“I became, officially, an Enemy of the State at sixteen.” - Miriam

Question 7

This linoleum palace… (propaganda/withholding information)

Answer 7

“This linoleum palace continues to contain all the necessities for life, at the same time as it refuses to admit a single thing… of beauty or joy” - Funder (simile, comparing East Germany and the house she’s staying in)

Question 8

The success propaganda… (propaganda/withholding information)

Answer 8

“The success propaganda in the GDR media did distance the people from us, because it was in such stark contrast to the reality” - von Schnitzler

Question 9

The GDR… (propaganda/withholding information)

Answer 9

“The GDR was like a religion. It was something I was brought up to believe in” - Hagen Koch

Question 10

By no fault… (propaganda/withholding information)

Answer 10

“By no fault of her own, Julia Behrend had fallen into the gap between the GDR’s fiction and its reality.”

Question 11

But looking back… (surveillance)

Answer 11

“But looking back on it, it’s total surveillance that damaged me the worst. I know how far people will transgress over your boundaries - until you have no private sphere left at all.” - Julia

Question 12

65 percent… (surveillance)

Answer 12

“65 percent of the church leaders were informers for us, and the rest of them were under surveillance anyhow.” - Herr Bock

Question 13

I think… (surveillance)

Answer 13

“I think at the end the Stasi had so much information… that they thought everyone was an enemy, because everyone was under observation.” - Fair haired man

Question 14

For Miriam… (love/hope)

Answer 14

“For Miriam, the past stopped when Charlie died. Her memories of picnics or cooking meals or holidays, her real life, are memories where she is a we”.

Question 15

At that moment… (love/hope)

Answer 15

“At that moment my world broke apart.” - Hagen Koch (when his wife was forced into divorcing him)

Question 16

She knew… (love/hope)

Answer 16

“She knew only that, if she accepted, they would have her then, her soul bought with a visit to her critically ill son.”

Question 17

To remember… (memory)

Answer 17

“To remember or forget - which is healthier?” - Mayor

Question 18

Stasi files… (memory)

Answer 18

“Stasi files. Should they be opened or burnt? Should they be locked away for fifty years and then opened, when the people in them would be dead or, possibly, forgiven?”

Question 19

The stories… (memory)

Answer 19

“The stories of ordinary people must be told.” - Julia

Question 20

For Miriam… (memory)

Answer 20

“For Miriam, the past stopped when Charlie died. Her memories of picnics or cooking meals or holidays, her real life, are memories where she is a we”.

Question 21

Memory… (memory)

Answer 21

“Memory, like so much else, is unreliable. Not only for what it hides and what it alters, but also for what it reveals.”

Question 22

She is a… (memory/betrayal)

Answer 22

“She is a hermit crab, all soft-fleshed with friends but ready to whisk back into its shell at the slightest sign of contact.”

Question 23

The only thing… (forms of control)

Answer 23

“The only thing that ever got clearer was that they had the power, in the circumstances.” - Miriam

Question 24

He can switch… (propaganda)

Answer 24

“He can switch from one view to another with frightening ease. I think it is a sign of being accustomed to such power that the truth does not matter because you cannot be contradicted.”

Question 25

The Party belatedly… (propaganda)

Answer 25

“The Party belatedly tried to change its image.” (Krenz replacing Honecker)

Question 26

That room… (persecution)

Answer 26

“That room was where a deal was offered and refused, and a soul buckled out of shape, forever.”

Question 27

I wondered… (persecution)

Answer 27

“I wondered what it would feel like to find out that you had been brought up by your parents as a paragon of a regime they did not believe in.”

Question 28

This man… (surveillance)

Answer 28

“This man knew everything.” - Julia

Question 29

Our own country… (propaganda)

Answer 29

“Our own country was feeding us lies and our futures depended on seeming to agree with it all.” - Julia

Question 30

You cannot… (identity and conformity)

Answer 30

“You cannot destroy your own past nor what it does to you. It’s not ever, really over.” - Julia

Question 31

Herr Winz waiting for…

Answer 31

the “Second Coming of socialism.”

Question 32

It was so… (Ostalgie)

Answer 32

“It was so much better before.” - Professor Mushroom

Question 33

She starts to… (trauma)

Answer 33

“She starts to crumble and break. At this moment, she does not look like a woman who was saved from anything.” (about Frau Paul retelling the story where she chose against her son)

Question 34

What the Stasi did before losing power? (Withholding information)

Answer 34

They destroyed evidence leaving only “shredded and hand-ripped files, index cards, photos and unwound tapes and film.” (To do with the puzzlers)

Question 35

Von Schnitzler’s ___ ___ ___ focused on ___-___ (propaganda)

Answer 35

Von Schnitzler’s “The Black Channel” focused on “anti-imperialism.”

Question 36

I’d really like… (Ostalgie, fear of outside world)

Answer 36

“I’d really like to have me a look at that Wall of theirs.” - Toilet Madam (showing she misses the Berlin Wall)