Bebelplatz
Bebelplatz features on the Gingerguide audio walk through Berlin. Give it roughly ~20 min: enough to look, hear a two to three minute story on the spot, and ask the AI guide whatever the story leaves open.
- Type square
- Suggested visit ~20 min
- Berlin Berlin guide
About Bebelplatz
The 'Book Burning Square', where the Nazis burned 20,000 books on 10 May 1933, now marked by Micha Ullman's haunting underground empty library visible through a glass window in the pavement.
Bebelplatz, formerly the Opera Square, is the site of one of the most notorious acts of Nazi cultural vandalism. On the night of 10 May 1933, four months after Hitler became Chancellor, Nazi student organisations burned approximately 20,000 books by Jewish, communist, pacifist, and other 'undesirable' authors in a massive bonfire. The works of Sigmund Freud, Karl Marx, Heinrich Heine, Bertolt Brecht, Erich Maria Remarque, and hundreds of others were burned. The event was theatrically organised and broadcast on national radio. Uncannily, the poet Heinrich Heine had written in 1820: 'Where they burn books, they will ultimately burn people also.' Today the square is marked by Micha Ullman's 1995 memorial 'Versunkene Bibliothek' (Sunken Library), an underground room of empty white bookshelves, holding space for the 20,000 missing volumes, visible only through a glass window set flush with the pavement. A plaque quotes Heine's prophecy.
Did you know? Heinrich Heine wrote in 1820, 113 years before the event, 'Where they burn books, they will ultimately burn people also.' The Nazis burned Heine's own books in 1933.
How long is a visit to Bebelplatz?
Set aside roughly ~20 min for Bebelplatz. That covers a good look and the narrated story, and because you set the pace you can always stay on.
Is Bebelplatz worth your time?
Bebelplatz is among the 43 narrated highlights the Gingerguide team chose for Berlin, so it is worth a look. Hear the story for the context, then ask the AI guide for anything more.
Nearby stops in Berlin
Hear the story of Bebelplatz
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