author
Hans Siemsen
1891–1969
A sharp-eyed voice from Weimar-era Germany, he wrote with energy about theater, film, and public life. His work also reflects the upheavals of exile and the political struggles that shaped the 20th century.
1 Audiobook
Auch ich, auch du: Aufzeichnungen eines Irren.
by Hans Siemsen
About the author
Born on March 27, 1891, in Mark near Hamm, Hans Siemsen was a German writer and journalist who became known for his theater and film criticism. During the Weimar Republic, he wrote for influential publications including Die Weltbühne and Berlin newspapers, earning a reputation as an early champion of film as a serious art form.
Siemsen was also a politically engaged public voice. After the rise of the Nazi regime in 1933, he went into exile, and his life and writing were deeply marked by displacement and resistance to authoritarianism. He later returned to Germany, where he lived until his death in Essen on June 23, 1969.
Alongside journalism, he published books and essays under his own name and the pseudonym Pfarrer Silesius. Today he is remembered as a lively cultural critic and a writer whose career connects the artistic freedom of the Weimar years with the ruptures of exile and postwar memory.