Join me for a 50-minute narrated visual journey through the former Buchenwald Concentration Camp in Germany, followed by a brief exploration of Weimar the birthplace of Goethe.
Dear Gloria, thank you. I would be eternally grateful if you might consider cross-posting this documentary on your publication after you have watched it.
It means the world to me, and I am truly grateful. This is one of the greatest gifts I have received—directly tied to me and my work. Knowing you found it worthy to share with your much larger audience is an honor I don’t take lightly. Thank you.
It's absolute solid proof of what I tried so hard to get readers to understand the danger of this new monstrous administration. I'm grateful that you experienced those horrors for us and spent time with them to share with us. It must have been horrific.
This was my fourth visit to Buchenwald in 25 years, and the exhibitions have changed over time. The first visit was the hardest—early February, cold rain, icy wind, grey sky thick with snow. I was with a group of secondary school students, led by a history and English teacher who was a friend of mine and my wife’s. I remember the silence, the vast emptiness, the echoes in the wind. It felt like running against a wall of ice.
Our friend guided us through the site herself. Only on my third visit did I see the quarry. This time, the Blood Road and the GDR Memorial were firsts for me. Everything—the barracks, the houses inside, the weapons factories, the 3.1-mile cobblestone Blood Road, paved with stones from the very quarry—was built with forced labor. That’s why they needed so many prisoners.
I only briefly mentioned the 139 subcamps connected to Buchenwald, but they were an essential part of its operation. Some were small, others specialized. My great-great cousin, Erna Siegman, was murdered in the Nazi Aktion T4 program in Hadamar, Hesse, on June 13, 1941. Hadamar was one of Buchenwald’s subcamps. Another was Mittelbau-Dora near Nordhausen, about 45 miles from Einbeck. That underground camp, tied to the V-2 rocket production, was a place of relentless forced labor, where prisoners died from malnutrition, overwork, disease, and executions—without ever seeing daylight. I have never visited Mittelbau-Dora.
When we visited with the school group, we spent two hours in Buchenwald before spending the rest of the day in Weimar, exploring Goethe’s house and other sites connected to Goethe and Schiller. It was always a stark contrast—one meant to force reflection on the extremes of human civilization.
So brave, so well articulated. Many moments in your documentary moved my heart: the Blood Road, individual portraits; yet I felt especially chilled by the sweetly charming scene of the town square, in stark contrast to the brutal realities of the camp.
As writers, each of us is a potential target in an authoritarian regime. Intellectuals are singled out. Our minds are free. Our ideas are dangerous to those who'd control humans with fear.
May your insightful mind and heart-wrenching truths open us to imagine: what is my place in this, today?
Thank you Christine. Yes, the citizens of Weimar, though they claimed loudly after the war that they have not been aware of the atrocities happening "up there" on the hill called Ettersberg, where Buchenwald is located, did earn quite a penny from provisioning the camp with almost everything it needed.
Yikes. 😱 I clipped the screen with this horrific message: “It was when the civilians began repeating,”We didn’t know! “We didn’t know!” That the ex-prisoners were carried away with wrath. “You did know,“ They shouted. “side-by-side we worked with you in the factories. At the risk of our lives we told you. But you did nothing.”
Yes, they claimed they didn’t know and everybody around Buchenwald knew it not to be true. They delivered, the worked in the barracks and The two weapons factories on the extensive areal of Buchenwald, they worked in the hospital where the prisoners and SS where treated, In the Weimar crematorium where those who did not survive the murderous work and dire conditions and provisioning where first cremated. The worked as farmers and rancher, providing food, …. They did know, and turned a blind eye.
The reach from history into the present day is so strong. It was the reason why I felt that inner pull to re-visit and therefore it was necessary for me to connect the dots.
Lorraine, This documentary didn’t come from any external inspiration—it came from my own personal history. I learned that a great-great cousin of mine was murdered in 1941 in Hadamar, one of Buchenwald’s subcamps, where the Nazis carried out their so-called euthanasia program. That knowledge stayed with me. In the wake of my own personal trauma, I felt an inner pull to return to Buchenwald.
When I first mentioned the idea of doing a walkthrough to Gloria, she expressed interest, and that was the moment this project took shape. It wasn’t just about revisiting history—it was about stepping into it, standing in the spaces where these things happened, and bringing others along with me.
Brenda, There are no words that can truly hold the weight of this history. The sorrow is real, and it lingers in the silence of these places, in the absence of those who should have lived. Thank you for sitting with it, for witnessing.
Bob, Thank you for taking the time to watch. Remembering is not passive—it’s an active choice. I appreciate you being here and acknowledging this history.
Thank you Jay for this documentary juxtapositioning the terrifying similarity with Trump and his Maga Cult Syncophants. We could never in our wildest dreams imagine anything like this happening again....but here we are. You did an excellent job. Thank you.
Jennifer, I appreciate you taking the time to watch and engage with this. The parallels are undeniable, and ignoring them only allows history to repeat itself. I never expected to be standing in this moment either—yet here we are. Thank you for recognizing the importance of this work and for your words of support.
The losses are immeasurable, and the warnings are right in front of us. History isn’t distant—it’s present, waiting for us to decide what we do with it. Thank you for taking this in.
Wow Jay . You are truly a force of nature . Every comment I want to make sounds like a cliche - chilling, powerful, terrifying, heartbreaking, soul wrenching… . I thought the rawness of the footage was perfect . I’m going to be sitting with those images for a long time , and with all the reading I’ve done around the Holocaust, it doesn’t compare to actually seeing those ovens and that road and that parade ground. Thank you for allowing us to witness and to honour this living history with you .
Your words mean so much because that was exactly what I hoped to achieve—to bring you there with me, to have you standing beside me, walking those grounds, feeling the weight of that space. Your comment confirms that it came through, and that is the greatest compliment I could receive.
Some images stay with us because they need to. Thank you for witnessing, for honoring, and for holding this history with me.
I took a train from Munich to Dachau in 1971, to see firsthand a place of evil in history. After walking through the site, seeing the ovens, I choked with emotion. The despair and rot and tragedy and suffering and deaths in the atmosphere was overwhelming. You can feel it. That place, and the others like it, are witnesses to the utter inhumanity and horror people are capable of. It is crushing.
Thank you for sharing this. That weight, that atmosphere—it lingers, and it speaks. These places are more than historical sites; they are witnesses, as you said, holding the echoes of what happened there. Walking through them, feeling that overwhelming presence, is something that never leaves you.
Never Again Is Now. Thank you in helping reaching other people to remember, too.
Yes, all too human. That’s what lingers the most. Not an isolated horror, not something separate from what humanity is capable of—but something woven into history by deliberate choices.
Thank you for watching, for taking this in. The closing reflections matter because this isn’t just about looking back. It’s about recognizing what still needs to be seen.
Andrew, I like your enthusiasm. I mean so many people go and watch Horror Movies with enthusiasm, why not a documentary about the horror's of Nazi Germany?
Thank you for this, Jay. I had to stop it several times to catch my breath. I sat in silence for a long time after the krematorium. I keep thinking about my grandmother who was a Navy nurse in WWII, how she gave up her entire identity to stay as far under the radar as possible. The fear she lived with because of everything she saw. I keep thinking about the artists lost. My heart feels too big for my body after watching this.
Thank you for the time and care you took to bring us to the place with you.
Thank you for walking through this with me. The weight of history doesn’t stay contained in a place—it lingers in the people who lived through it, in what they carried and what they had to leave behind. Your grandmother’s story holds so much in just those few words. The losses ripple outward—artists, voices, entire lives that should have continued.
I see your heart in this, and I’m grateful you shared this moment with me. Love you too, friend. ❤️
Wild Lion*esses Pride from Jay: What astounds is Buchenwald -- cynically perverting "Jedem das Seine" -- with its ovens that come close to inducing vomit, in the wake of what was really the new Athens in the 19th Century in Weimar with such lights of humanity as Johann Gottfried Herder, Christoph Martin Wieland, Jean Paul, Friedrich Schiller, Goethe . . .
Weimar had some of the greatest humane and loving persons among these literary greats.
And yet a mere century later . . . Degradation more hollow and horrid than the deepest inferno of Dante.
Promise: This week I am writing a piece to refer readers to your film and commentary.
Your piece moves me.
One thing has to be personally experienced: In the Holocaust Memorial in Washington, DC, the room that choked me with tears was the Shoe-Room.
My God, thousands of shoes, gaping, open, receptive to the last child's, woman's foot that filled it.
The shoe gapes, hungry for the child's, the woman's foot.
One senses that approaching the shoe, maybe one could sense the texture of the foot filling the shoe or the odor from the foot and leg.
That human connection with a feeling person, a young girl or boy, or a woman, who had a soul and Spirit and who longed for the future.
That PRESENCE did choke hardened Armando with tears.
And Buchenwald, in your presentation, has such a Shoe-Room.
And the memorials. You walk by articles about a woman, a child, a man, maybe many we have not previously known, and then . . . suddenly . . . to bring it home . . . Dietrich Bonhoeffer.
Your lessons for a hardened, neo-Nazi Brownshirt regime in Washington with its degradation of human rights.
Very, very good!
Thank you so very much.
You conduct the virtual tour with tremendous dignity and love for each human person.
You are a grand and wonderful person!
Not only here, but with my Goethe Gesellschaft friends, I will share your story!
Thank you for sharing your thoughts and for bringing this contrast into focus. The weight of Buchenwald isn’t just in its history but in the space itself—vast, open, emptied of those who once suffered there. Walking through it, the absence is overwhelming. The roll call square, where thousands once stood for hours, is silent. The barracks are gone, yet the ground holds their memory. The crematorium remains, an unflinching presence among the void left behind.
I haven’t been to the Holocaust Museum in Washington, yet I can understand the impact of the Shoe Room. In Buchenwald, there is a section filled with shoes, and standing there, it’s impossible not to see what is missing—the lives, the stories, the futures that should have been.
I appreciate you sharing my work and bringing it to your Goethe Gesellschaft friends. This history isn’t distant, and remembering isn’t passive. Thank you for making space for it.
Wow, thank you for sharing - what a tremendous effort to tell horrendous story that wasn’t even that long ago. You said many times how history continues. Sadly, and the beauty that you bring to it by remembering all of these people. Very gut wrenching, and sad.
You did a beautiful job. I can’t imagine that it was easy to put all this together.
Thank you for your time research and letting us travel with you. Your storytelling is amazing.
Thank you for your kind words and for walking through this history with me. It wasn’t easy, and it felt to me personally necessary—especially now. Remembering isn’t just about the past; it’s about seeing how these patterns continue and refusing to look away.
Creativity and cruelty coexisting—that contrast has stayed with me, too. The resilience, the small acts of defiance, the stories of those who endured—those deserve to be told just as much as the horrors.
I appreciate you taking the time to engage with this and for holding space for it.
I’m watching later this morning. Thank you 🙏 for all the time, effort, and pain you experienced to complete this project.
Dear Gloria, thank you. I would be eternally grateful if you might consider cross-posting this documentary on your publication after you have watched it.
I have cross posted with your description. It should be published immediately.
Gloria,
It means the world to me, and I am truly grateful. This is one of the greatest gifts I have received—directly tied to me and my work. Knowing you found it worthy to share with your much larger audience is an honor I don’t take lightly. Thank you.
It's absolute solid proof of what I tried so hard to get readers to understand the danger of this new monstrous administration. I'm grateful that you experienced those horrors for us and spent time with them to share with us. It must have been horrific.
Gloria,
This was my fourth visit to Buchenwald in 25 years, and the exhibitions have changed over time. The first visit was the hardest—early February, cold rain, icy wind, grey sky thick with snow. I was with a group of secondary school students, led by a history and English teacher who was a friend of mine and my wife’s. I remember the silence, the vast emptiness, the echoes in the wind. It felt like running against a wall of ice.
Our friend guided us through the site herself. Only on my third visit did I see the quarry. This time, the Blood Road and the GDR Memorial were firsts for me. Everything—the barracks, the houses inside, the weapons factories, the 3.1-mile cobblestone Blood Road, paved with stones from the very quarry—was built with forced labor. That’s why they needed so many prisoners.
I only briefly mentioned the 139 subcamps connected to Buchenwald, but they were an essential part of its operation. Some were small, others specialized. My great-great cousin, Erna Siegman, was murdered in the Nazi Aktion T4 program in Hadamar, Hesse, on June 13, 1941. Hadamar was one of Buchenwald’s subcamps. Another was Mittelbau-Dora near Nordhausen, about 45 miles from Einbeck. That underground camp, tied to the V-2 rocket production, was a place of relentless forced labor, where prisoners died from malnutrition, overwork, disease, and executions—without ever seeing daylight. I have never visited Mittelbau-Dora.
When we visited with the school group, we spent two hours in Buchenwald before spending the rest of the day in Weimar, exploring Goethe’s house and other sites connected to Goethe and Schiller. It was always a stark contrast—one meant to force reflection on the extremes of human civilization.
Mind numbing.
I will. That sounds tricky. DM me instructions and I will.
Amy and I are working on it.
So brave, so well articulated. Many moments in your documentary moved my heart: the Blood Road, individual portraits; yet I felt especially chilled by the sweetly charming scene of the town square, in stark contrast to the brutal realities of the camp.
As writers, each of us is a potential target in an authoritarian regime. Intellectuals are singled out. Our minds are free. Our ideas are dangerous to those who'd control humans with fear.
May your insightful mind and heart-wrenching truths open us to imagine: what is my place in this, today?
Thank you Christine. Yes, the citizens of Weimar, though they claimed loudly after the war that they have not been aware of the atrocities happening "up there" on the hill called Ettersberg, where Buchenwald is located, did earn quite a penny from provisioning the camp with almost everything it needed.
Yikes. 😱 I clipped the screen with this horrific message: “It was when the civilians began repeating,”We didn’t know! “We didn’t know!” That the ex-prisoners were carried away with wrath. “You did know,“ They shouted. “side-by-side we worked with you in the factories. At the risk of our lives we told you. But you did nothing.”
Yes, they claimed they didn’t know and everybody around Buchenwald knew it not to be true. They delivered, the worked in the barracks and The two weapons factories on the extensive areal of Buchenwald, they worked in the hospital where the prisoners and SS where treated, In the Weimar crematorium where those who did not survive the murderous work and dire conditions and provisioning where first cremated. The worked as farmers and rancher, providing food, …. They did know, and turned a blind eye.
Wow.
Thank you for telling viewers that these atrocities are not gone, and I’m grateful that you specifically pointed out the United States as it is today
The reach from history into the present day is so strong. It was the reason why I felt that inner pull to re-visit and therefore it was necessary for me to connect the dots.
Thank you WLP, this is so important. Watching A Real Pain gave the viewer permission to feel the raw insanity of it all. This is a great follow up.
Lorraine, This documentary didn’t come from any external inspiration—it came from my own personal history. I learned that a great-great cousin of mine was murdered in 1941 in Hadamar, one of Buchenwald’s subcamps, where the Nazis carried out their so-called euthanasia program. That knowledge stayed with me. In the wake of my own personal trauma, I felt an inner pull to return to Buchenwald.
When I first mentioned the idea of doing a walkthrough to Gloria, she expressed interest, and that was the moment this project took shape. It wasn’t just about revisiting history—it was about stepping into it, standing in the spaces where these things happened, and bringing others along with me.
Unspeakable sorrow covers my soul.
Brenda, There are no words that can truly hold the weight of this history. The sorrow is real, and it lingers in the silence of these places, in the absence of those who should have lived. Thank you for sitting with it, for witnessing.
Thank you for this. Lest we forget...
Bob, Thank you for taking the time to watch. Remembering is not passive—it’s an active choice. I appreciate you being here and acknowledging this history.
I can’t dwell, the evil rots my soul and tortures my emotions. Fear not, I shan’t forget.
Thank you Jay for this documentary juxtapositioning the terrifying similarity with Trump and his Maga Cult Syncophants. We could never in our wildest dreams imagine anything like this happening again....but here we are. You did an excellent job. Thank you.
Jennifer, I appreciate you taking the time to watch and engage with this. The parallels are undeniable, and ignoring them only allows history to repeat itself. I never expected to be standing in this moment either—yet here we are. Thank you for recognizing the importance of this work and for your words of support.
What a powerful reminder of all that was lost and all we stand to lose...
Yes. Exactly.
Kristin,
The losses are immeasurable, and the warnings are right in front of us. History isn’t distant—it’s present, waiting for us to decide what we do with it. Thank you for taking this in.
Wow Jay . You are truly a force of nature . Every comment I want to make sounds like a cliche - chilling, powerful, terrifying, heartbreaking, soul wrenching… . I thought the rawness of the footage was perfect . I’m going to be sitting with those images for a long time , and with all the reading I’ve done around the Holocaust, it doesn’t compare to actually seeing those ovens and that road and that parade ground. Thank you for allowing us to witness and to honour this living history with you .
Pippa,
Your words mean so much because that was exactly what I hoped to achieve—to bring you there with me, to have you standing beside me, walking those grounds, feeling the weight of that space. Your comment confirms that it came through, and that is the greatest compliment I could receive.
Some images stay with us because they need to. Thank you for witnessing, for honoring, and for holding this history with me.
Thank you, we must never forget.
I took a train from Munich to Dachau in 1971, to see firsthand a place of evil in history. After walking through the site, seeing the ovens, I choked with emotion. The despair and rot and tragedy and suffering and deaths in the atmosphere was overwhelming. You can feel it. That place, and the others like it, are witnesses to the utter inhumanity and horror people are capable of. It is crushing.
Rain,
Thank you for sharing this. That weight, that atmosphere—it lingers, and it speaks. These places are more than historical sites; they are witnesses, as you said, holding the echoes of what happened there. Walking through them, feeling that overwhelming presence, is something that never leaves you.
Never Again Is Now. Thank you in helping reaching other people to remember, too.
Devastating. Shameful. Inhumane.....but all to human. The thoughtful closing remarks are worth remembering.
Leon,
Yes, all too human. That’s what lingers the most. Not an isolated horror, not something separate from what humanity is capable of—but something woven into history by deliberate choices.
Thank you for watching, for taking this in. The closing reflections matter because this isn’t just about looking back. It’s about recognizing what still needs to be seen.
Awesome, can’t wait to watch! Errr…or maybe a little less enthusiasm? Lol It’s not like I’m going to make popcorn or anything 💀
Andrew, I like your enthusiasm. I mean so many people go and watch Horror Movies with enthusiasm, why not a documentary about the horror's of Nazi Germany?
Bahaha! Why not?!?
Thank you for this, Jay. I had to stop it several times to catch my breath. I sat in silence for a long time after the krematorium. I keep thinking about my grandmother who was a Navy nurse in WWII, how she gave up her entire identity to stay as far under the radar as possible. The fear she lived with because of everything she saw. I keep thinking about the artists lost. My heart feels too big for my body after watching this.
Thank you for the time and care you took to bring us to the place with you.
Love you, friend <3
Mesa,
Thank you for walking through this with me. The weight of history doesn’t stay contained in a place—it lingers in the people who lived through it, in what they carried and what they had to leave behind. Your grandmother’s story holds so much in just those few words. The losses ripple outward—artists, voices, entire lives that should have continued.
I see your heart in this, and I’m grateful you shared this moment with me. Love you too, friend. ❤️
Wild Lion*esses Pride from Jay: What astounds is Buchenwald -- cynically perverting "Jedem das Seine" -- with its ovens that come close to inducing vomit, in the wake of what was really the new Athens in the 19th Century in Weimar with such lights of humanity as Johann Gottfried Herder, Christoph Martin Wieland, Jean Paul, Friedrich Schiller, Goethe . . .
Weimar had some of the greatest humane and loving persons among these literary greats.
And yet a mere century later . . . Degradation more hollow and horrid than the deepest inferno of Dante.
Promise: This week I am writing a piece to refer readers to your film and commentary.
Your piece moves me.
One thing has to be personally experienced: In the Holocaust Memorial in Washington, DC, the room that choked me with tears was the Shoe-Room.
My God, thousands of shoes, gaping, open, receptive to the last child's, woman's foot that filled it.
The shoe gapes, hungry for the child's, the woman's foot.
One senses that approaching the shoe, maybe one could sense the texture of the foot filling the shoe or the odor from the foot and leg.
That human connection with a feeling person, a young girl or boy, or a woman, who had a soul and Spirit and who longed for the future.
That PRESENCE did choke hardened Armando with tears.
And Buchenwald, in your presentation, has such a Shoe-Room.
And the memorials. You walk by articles about a woman, a child, a man, maybe many we have not previously known, and then . . . suddenly . . . to bring it home . . . Dietrich Bonhoeffer.
Your lessons for a hardened, neo-Nazi Brownshirt regime in Washington with its degradation of human rights.
Very, very good!
Thank you so very much.
You conduct the virtual tour with tremendous dignity and love for each human person.
You are a grand and wonderful person!
Not only here, but with my Goethe Gesellschaft friends, I will share your story!
Armand,
Thank you for sharing your thoughts and for bringing this contrast into focus. The weight of Buchenwald isn’t just in its history but in the space itself—vast, open, emptied of those who once suffered there. Walking through it, the absence is overwhelming. The roll call square, where thousands once stood for hours, is silent. The barracks are gone, yet the ground holds their memory. The crematorium remains, an unflinching presence among the void left behind.
I haven’t been to the Holocaust Museum in Washington, yet I can understand the impact of the Shoe Room. In Buchenwald, there is a section filled with shoes, and standing there, it’s impossible not to see what is missing—the lives, the stories, the futures that should have been.
I appreciate you sharing my work and bringing it to your Goethe Gesellschaft friends. This history isn’t distant, and remembering isn’t passive. Thank you for making space for it.
Dear Jay,
Wow, thank you for sharing - what a tremendous effort to tell horrendous story that wasn’t even that long ago. You said many times how history continues. Sadly, and the beauty that you bring to it by remembering all of these people. Very gut wrenching, and sad.
You did a beautiful job. I can’t imagine that it was easy to put all this together.
Thank you for your time research and letting us travel with you. Your storytelling is amazing.
Creativity and cruelty co-existing…
Blessings on your brave heart
🌹🌹🌹
Prajna,
Thank you for your kind words and for walking through this history with me. It wasn’t easy, and it felt to me personally necessary—especially now. Remembering isn’t just about the past; it’s about seeing how these patterns continue and refusing to look away.
Creativity and cruelty coexisting—that contrast has stayed with me, too. The resilience, the small acts of defiance, the stories of those who endured—those deserve to be told just as much as the horrors.
I appreciate you taking the time to engage with this and for holding space for it.
Thank you so very much for this 🖖🤗🥰❤️🥀
I am grateful for your thanks and that my work spoke to you.