Amanda Rubin, documentary filmmaker and journalist, has brought The Third Reich of Dreams, a long-overlooked classic back to print in a newly-translated English edition (Princeton Press, 2025). Her Mortenson Distinguished Lecture will share Beradt’s incredible untold story and legacy of courage as a woman, journalist, and refugee. This hybrid lecture will focus on the power of the irrepressible imagination and the potent symbolism of books, writing and archiving as “witnesses to history” and will be followed by a reception and book signing.
Book Description:
Set in Berlin, 1933. shortly after Hitler is elected Chancellor, Journalist Charlotte Beradt (1906-1968) begins to experience vivid, disturbing nightmares. Realizing she’s not alone, she embarks on a quiet mission to record the dream life of her Jewish and non-Jewish friends, colleagues, and neighbors in Berlin. She compiles an extraordinary document of the slow colonization of the unconscious as the Third Reich’s persecutions and propaganda seep into the last refuge of the private self. The resulting book: The Third Reich of Dreams
Please visit our website: library.illinois.edu/mortenson/lectures/ to learn more about the Lecture and the following events:
- Tuesday, September 2, 2025; 4:00-5:15pm
Dreams as Inspiration, Insights, Foreshadowing and Evidence: A Panel Discussion Through the Lens of “The Third Reich of Dreams”, with Amanda Rubin, Brett Ashley Kaplan and Guests
Location: School of Information Sciences, 614 E. Daniel St., Champaign, Room 4045 - Wednesday, September 3, 2025; 9-4pm
Crafting Compelling Stories: A Hands-On Visual Storytelling Workshop, facilitated by Amanda Rubin
Location: Main Library, Room 314 (1408 West Gregory Dr., Urbana). Capacity: 24 | Registration required.
CO-SPONSORS: Champaign Urbana Jewish Federation | Mortenson Center for International Library Programs | The Program in Jewish Culture & Society | School of Information Sciences | UNESCO Center for Global Citizenship | University of Illinois Library Urbana-Champaign
SUPPORTERS: The Initiative in Holocaust, Genocide, Memory Studies