{"id":3331,"date":"2026-02-16T13:59:49","date_gmt":"2026-02-16T18:59:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/krieger.jhu.edu\/cams\/?p=3331"},"modified":"2026-05-04T14:46:53","modified_gmt":"2026-05-04T18:46:53","slug":"the-last-days-by-martin-prinz-reading-and-panel-discussion","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/krieger.jhu.edu\/cams\/2026\/02\/16\/the-last-days-by-martin-prinz-reading-and-panel-discussion\/","title":{"rendered":"Martin Prinz: Reading, Panel Discussion, and Open Classroom Visit"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

In The Last Days<\/em> (Die letzen Tage)<\/em>, shortlisted for the Austrian Book Prize 2025, Martin Prinz reenacts the events of April 1945 in a valley of the Austrian Eastern Alps, where innocent people were arbitrarily tried and executed by Nazi summary courts, among them the granddaughters of Arthur Schnitzler\u2019s muse Olga Waissnix. In these final 41 days of the war, more people were murdered in Austria than in the previous seven years. Two years later, the main perpetrators appeared before a people\u2019s court, insisting on the legality of their actions and invoking obedience to a state that had already ceased to exist. Drawing on trial records and contemporary documents, the book presents these events with sober precision and reflects on individual responsibility under extreme conditions and on literature as a form of remembrance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Center for Advanced Media Studies, in partnership with the Austrian Cultural Forum and the Stulman Program in Jewish Studies, will be presenting three events with Martin Prinz in support of his novel. More information is below:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Last Days<\/em> (Die letzen Tage)<\/em> Reading & Panel Discussion<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

With author Martin Prinz and historian James Loeffler. Moderated by filmmaker Bernadette Wegenstein.<\/em>
March 26, 2026
Doors open at 6:15pm
Event at 7:00-8:30 PM
Embassy of Austria, Washington DC.<\/strong>
ID required upon entry.<\/em> <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The war was almost over, but the killings continued. Set in April 1945 near Vienna, The Last Days<\/em> (Die letzen Tage)<\/em> (2025) reconstructs a Nazi society that enables these crimes in Austria, where a summary court sentenced citizens to death for alleged defeatism and desertion. Written in the restrained language of court records, Martin Prinz\u2019s book examines individual responsibility, arbitrary power, and the long silence that followed these crimes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Limited space is available on a BlueJay shuttle for Hopkins students, leaving at 4 PM and returning at 10 PM. RSVP by emailing ccalabr7@jh.edu.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

During the event, an exclusive clip from the upcoming documentary \u201cThe Archives,\u201d produced and directed by filmmaker Bernadette Wegenstein.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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“The Archives” documentary by Bernadette Wegenstein (2026), film still.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Open Classroom Visit<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

With author Martin Prinz and professors Katrin Pahl and Bernadette Wegenstein<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

March 31st
4-6pm
Gilman 479<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Open to all students. RSVP by emailing ccalabr7@jh.edu. Students will receive an exclusive English translation of a chapter from The Last Days<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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MARTIN PRINZ – Born in 1973, Martin Prinz grew up in Lilienfeld and now lives in Vienna. He writes travel stories, screenplays, and novels, including\u202f \u201cThe Robber\u202fand\u202fThe Last Princess\u201d, and has received numerous awards, among them the screenplay prize at the Gij\u00f3n International Film Festival.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

THE LAST DAYS – A valley opening in the Eastern Alps, April 1945\u2014the days of the “Tausendj\u00e4hrigen Reiches” are numbered. In the blink of an eye, it has shrunk to nothing. District leader Johann Braun establishes his own personal court-martial, a private regime of murder. People are sentenced arbitrarily. Martin Prinz recounts the monstrous events with sobriety and a commitment to the facts. A harrowing documentary novel about a unique case in Austrian contemporary history.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n

\"jim<\/figure>
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JIM LOEFFLER – James Loeffler is Felix Posen Professor of Modern Jewish History at Johns Hopkins University, and Kogod Senior Research Fellow at the Shalom Hartman Institute of North America. He writes widely on modern Jewish history from antisemitism to Zionism, with a focus on the overlooked ties between the Jewish past and the global present in politics, law, and culture. His new upcoming book, “Exceptional Hatred: Antisemitism and the Fight over Free Speech in Modern America”, argues that, in a moment of democratic crisis, antisemitism has become an ideological obsession – and offers an argument for re-thinking how to reconcile free speech and equal rights in American law.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Find more on Jim Loeffler’s website<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n

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Bernadette Wegenstein is a US-Austrian documentary filmmaker and author. Bernadette has produced and directed several documentary features and shorts. Devoti tutti (2023), which premiered at Biografilm Bologna and won multiple film awards, including Best Documentary and Audience Awards. The Conductor (2021) premiered at Tribeca Film Festival, won five Best Documentary awards, and was nominated for an Emmy for Outstanding Arts & Culture Documentary. The documentary music short, See Me: A Global Concert, produced during the pandemic, won numerous Best Music Film and Best Editing awards, including the Firenze Corti Premio Rive Gauche. Her intimate breast cancer documentary, The Good Breast, premiered at the Geena Davis Gender Institute\u2019s Bentonville Film Festival. She has recently won a Discovery grant together with Marin Aslop to develop Fidelio and the Unjust Incarceration, a multimedia performance piece that combines Beethoven\u2019s Fidelio with newly created music and text.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Find more on Bernadette Wegenstein’s website<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n

Events in collaboration with the Austrian Cultural Forum<\/a> and the Stulman Program in Jewish Studies<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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In The Last Days (Die letzen Tage), shortlisted for the Austrian Book Prize 2025, Martin Prinz reenacts the events of April 1945 in a valley of the Austrian Eastern Alps, where innocent people were arbitrarily tried and executed by Nazi summary courts, among them the granddaughters of Arthur Schnitzler\u2019s muse Olga Waissnix. In these final […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":733,"featured_media":3386,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3331","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/krieger.jhu.edu\/cams\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3331","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/krieger.jhu.edu\/cams\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/krieger.jhu.edu\/cams\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/krieger.jhu.edu\/cams\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/733"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/krieger.jhu.edu\/cams\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3331"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/krieger.jhu.edu\/cams\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3331\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3478,"href":"https:\/\/krieger.jhu.edu\/cams\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3331\/revisions\/3478"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/krieger.jhu.edu\/cams\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3386"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/krieger.jhu.edu\/cams\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3331"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/krieger.jhu.edu\/cams\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3331"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/krieger.jhu.edu\/cams\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3331"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}