Summary of Anna Funder's Stasiland

Please note: This is a companion version & not the original book. Sample Book Insights: #1 I catch the underground to Leipzig, a couple of hours from Berlin. It’s snowing outside. I move through the slush to where I know there are toilets. The large woman in a purple apron and loud makeup at the bottom of the steps is guarding her stash of condoms and tissues and tampons. #2 I can’t smell anything anymore. The train travels through northern Germany, and I can feel myself falling asleep. I remember my mother’s moustache in the sun, my adolescent hunger, and the burnt chalk smell of tram brakes in summer. #3 I visited Leipzig in 1994, five years after the Wall fell in November 1989. I was looking for the Stasi museum, which had formerly been the Stasi offices. The Stasi was the internal army by which the government kept control. It knew everything about everyone, using any means it chose. #4 I visited the Runden Ecke, the area where the Stasi headquarters was located. The citizens’ committee that was in charge of the museum had mounted displays on cheap particleboard screens. There were pictures of protesters occupying the building on December 4, 1989.