Jennifer Teege is a German-Nigerian woman, who was placed in an orphanage and adopted at young age. While she had some contact with her German biological mother and grandmother, she mostly grew up with her adoptive family in Munich and spent her study years abroad in Tel Aviv, Israel.
In 2008 she randomly picked up a library book which made her realize the truth about the German side of her family. Recognizing photos of her mother and grandmother, she discovered a fact they had kept from her: her grandfather was Amon Goeth, the infamous Nazi commandant depicted in Schindler’s List by Ralph Fiennes. She wrote:
“I have entered a chamber of horrors. ... Slowly I begin to grasp that the Amon Goeth in the film Schindler’s List is not a fictional character, but a person who actually existed in flesh and blood. A man who killed people by the dozens and, what is more, who enjoyed it. My grandfather. I am the granddaughter of a mass murderer.”
At the age of 38, Jennifer Teege starts to learn the scope of her grandfather’s crimes and delves into researching her family’s past. Over the two years that follow, she reconnects with her mother Monika, explores the sites of Płaszów concentration camp and the former Jewish ghetto in Kraków. She travels to Israel and reveals her discoveries with beloved friends from college.
The Goethe-Institut supported the German to English translation by Carolin Sommer and heartily welcomes Jennifer Teege in a conversation with Peter Hellman, freelance journalist and a regular speaker on the topic of the Shoah.
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