People & Powers: Ruth Maier-the Anne Frank of Austria

ORF, December 7, 2022

German original: https://tv.orf.at/program/orf2/menschenma176.html

Martina Ebm reads from Ruth Maier's diaries in new documentary

Her diaries are part of UNESCO's “Memory of the World” documentary heritage. In her native Austria, however, she is hardly known: Ruth Maier, born into a Jewish family in Vienna in 1920, meticulously wrote diaries - about her private situation, but also about political developments in Austria before and after the invasion of German troops. She also wrote about her flight to Norway in 1939 and her time as a stranger and refugee. The entries end only shortly before her deportation to Auschwitz, where she was gassed on December 1, 1942. These are subtle and analytical observations of an extraordinarily sensitive and gifted young woman. It is no coincidence that Ruth Maier is often called the "Anne Frank of Austria" today.

Robert Gokl, creator of the "Menschen & Mächte" (People and Powers) documentary "Ruth Maier - die Anne Frank von Österreich" (Ruth Maier - the Anne Frank of Austria) followed Ruth Maier's path through Vienna and Norway. He and his camera team were accompanied by the well-known actress Martina Ebm, who reads from Ruth Maier's diaries. Ebm captures with a high level of acting sensitivity those moods that Ruth put down on paper.

Robert Gokl: "Her dedication, her team spirit and her intensive study of Ruth Maier's diaries have made Martina Ebm a stroke of luck for this documentary."

Martina Ebm: "I can easily put myself in Ruth Maier's place as a teenager, because I too was passionate about writing diaries at that age. The deep pain and loneliness as a result of her flight to Norway, which permeate the later diaries, I can only imagine as someone born later. Ruth lost everything that was dear to her in Vienna, while I live in safety. And in the end Ruth lost the most precious thing, her life. Her parting words reveal that she knows what is in store for her. This film gives voice to one who has been silenced. We must not stop dealing with the crimes of the Nazi regime, because they make us realize that we must act courageously where injustice occurs."

"I see the diary as if it were my friend."

From the age of twelve, Ruth Maier shared everything that concerned her with this friend, privately in her development from schoolgirl to adult woman, politically in her critical view of political and social developments, beginning with the civil war in Austria in February 1934.

Ruth's father was a social democrat and trade union official, so her political stance was left-wing from her youth. Her Jewish background, on the other hand, had no significance in the family, especially not a religious one. Only the invasion of German troops in March 1938 and the subsequent violence against Jews, including a pogrom in November 1938, changed that: "Yesterday was the most horrible day I have ever experienced!" she writes one day after her 18th birthday. It is November 10, 1938, the day of the November pogrom. And: "I am becoming a conscious Jew. I feel it. I can't help it."

Escape to "foreign Norway" for the time being

Already too old for a place on a Kindertransport, Ruth Maier is lucky enough to be able to flee to a host family in Norway in January 1939. There she wants to take her school-leaving exams and then continue on to her family, which has been able to flee to England. But one month before the Matura, the Wehrmacht marches into Norway. Ruth notes in her diary: "Now again. No difference. I am alone."

As a Jewish refugee, Ruth Maier is able to live without restrictions and self-determined, at least initially, even under German occupation. She does not experience violent and murderous anti-Semitism among the Norwegian population as she did in Vienna.

She secures her livelihood by volunteering for labor service several times. In one of these camps she meets Gunvor Hofmo, whose family has joined the communist resistance. The two young women fall in love and begin a relationship that lasts until Ruth Maier's deportation.

Ruth is arrested at the end of November 1942

In the port of Oslo, Ruth Maier is able to smuggle one last message to Gunvor Hofmo from the deportation ship "Donau": "I believe that it is good the way it has come. Why should we not suffer when there is so much suffering? Do not worry about me. I might not want to change places with you."

After Ruth Maier's murder, her diaries remained with Gunvor Hofmo and unknown to the public for more than half a century. Hofmo did become an important Norwegian writer after World War II, but her attempts to publish the diaries failed.

After Hofmo's death in 1997, Norwegian writer Jan Erik Vold found them in her estate and published them in 2007, and to date they have been published worldwide in more than ten languages. The impact of Ruth Maier's depiction of Norwegian society between collaboration with and resistance against the Nazi occupation was so lasting that, on Norwegian initiative, her diaries have been part of the World Document Heritage since 2014.

"Ruth Maier - the Anne Frank of Austria" was produced by ORF and sponsored by VGR (Verwertungsgesellschaft Rundfunk).