Dance of death. 1923 and its consequences

In a letter to her son and daughter-in-law, who were on holiday, Käthe Kollwitz wrote at the end of September 1923:

“By the way, as far as the salary is concerned: a messenger is not entrusted with the money, it would have to be fetched. (It is almost 2 billion). Since I can’t (…), it will probably have to stay there until after the 1st.”

An extremely impressive salary, you might think, were 1923 not the year of hyperinflation in Germany. In September, the artist probably paid at least 75,000 marks postage for the letter to Hans. The holiday card from Hiddensee, weeks earlier, had still been comparatively cheap at 50 marks. In November 1923, letter postage in the German Reich finally climbed to 1 billion marks. These figures are difficult for us to comprehend today. How could everyday life be managed at that time with this extreme devaluation of money?

Her grandmother’s stories about her experiences in the Ruhr area in 1923 sparked the author’s interest in the topic of inflation at an early age. Jutta Hoffritz has been writing for DIE ZEIT for 20 years, for example about the history of monetary policy, and also writes articles for Deutschlandfunk radio. The book on hyperinflation was inspired by a “calendar page” published to mark the 150th anniversary of the birth of Hugo Stinnes, a man who made money from inflation.

Alongside other well-known figures from contemporary history, the author also repeatedly refers to Käthe Kollwitz. The poster “Germany’s Children are starving!”, created by the Berlin artist for the Workers’ Welfare Association, is a symbol of the developments in 1923.

Käthe Kollwitz, Germany’s Children are starving!, poster, 1923, lithograph