East German culture has been ignored for too long. Until we embrace it, our country will remain dangerously divided | Carolin Würfel

When the stories of people like me who lived in the old socialist republic are dismissed, shame can spiral into anger that fuels the far right

When I went to school in the 1990s, GDR literature wasn't taught or read. It was treated as something shameful. I didn't dare to pick up a book by an East German writer, even though many of them were in our library at home in Leipzig. Looking back, I believe the reason was the public perception of the old socialist republic. It scared me off.

When the Berlin Wall fell on 9 November 1989, it marked the beginning of the end of East German art and literature. Everything that had shaped our cultural history was thought away, spoken away and written away. West Germans took sovereignty over the narrative, and their verdict was clear: the former East German state was wrong in every aspect and worth nothing. This also meant books, plays, paintings, sculptures, films and music were buried and left behind, because they too were considered wrong.

Carolin Wurfel is a writer, screenwriter and journalist. She is the author of Three Women Dreamed of Socialism and a regular contributor to Die Zeit