Theresienstadt Purim play presented at London synagogue

On 4 March 2015, Lisa Peschel was special guest at Harrow and Wembley Progressive Synagogue in northwest London for their Purim celebration. Dr Peschel, in collaboration with Rabbi Frank Dabba Smith, presented a rediscovered fragment of a Purim play performed during the Shoah in the Theresienstadt Ghetto. They focused on the humour in the text: how does the play reveal the prisoners' humanity, creativity and persistence of hope despite suffering harrowing persecution?

Members of the congregation performed sections of the text, discovering sometimes surprisingly funny moments and sharing, almost 70 years after the end of the war, in the prisoner's laughter -- laughter that, according to some survivors, saved their sanity and possibly their lives.

Dr. Lisa Peschel