We might live during a time when some of the hopes and values we cherished in the past are being torn apart by the climate catastrophe, by populism and rising fascism and wars started by small men lusting for power, but maybe it is not the end but a moment of darkness before the dawn. 

An excerpt from the novella “Eine Halligfahrt” (A Trip to the Hallig) by Theodor Storm, published in 1871, tells the great North Frisian drama: the city of Rungholt, located on the island of Strand in the North Frisian wadden sea, was devastated by a flood in 1326 and torn away by the breakers together with the ground it was built on.