A tale of abandonment

On May 13, 1939, a vessel set sail from Hamburg for Cuba with 937 German-Jewish refugees, following the violence of Kristallnacht. The refugees were denied entry to Cuba and then they had to sail from port to port, hoping to find a country that would accept them.

This event inspired Israeli playwright and director Hanoch Levin (1943-99) to write a play, which, instead of a historic piece, turned out to be a poetic and dreamy piece, entitled The Child Dreams.

Premiered in 1993, The Child Dreams was first staged as a joint production by Habima National Theatre, the Haifa Theater and the Israel Festival, and was directed by Levin himself.

The play will make its debut in China with two shows on Nov 16 and 17 at the Tianqiao Performing Arts Center in Beijing, as part of the ongoing third Lao She Theatre Festival, which celebrates the legacy of the renowned Chinese writer Lao She (1899-1966) with international theater productions staged in the capital from Sept 19 to Nov 23.

The play, presented by the National Theatre of Bitola and directed by Israel-born artist Itai Doron, is the version of The Child Dreams done by the National Theatre of Bitola which premiered on Jan 26.