I Never Saw Another Butterfly Becomes a Play

The Book

From collages, to crayon pictures and poems, to letters for lost parents, Hana Molavkova gathered together a recovered collection of the thoughts, ideas, dreams and nightmares of the young children imprisoned at Terezin and published the book I Never Saw Another Butterfly.

The simple pictures of home, loved ones, butterflies and flowers indicate that the children searched for hope in a hopeless situation, and the poetry about their towns, homelands, friends, and freedom suggests that they dreamed dreams about a future that would restore them to the normal lives they had experienced in the past.

Where Does a Play Begin?

Celeste R. Raspanti, a published playwright, brought the Holocaust to the stage with I Never Saw Another Butterfly, No Fading Star and The Terezin Promise, enriching these dramas with firsthand information of the camps from visits, oral histories and her friendship with survivors.

When asked, “Where do your ideas come from? How do you begin?” Her answer is direct. “I begin in fact, in history, in that little knot of truth that I can unravel and spin into a drama. And I find my subjects everywhere, though sometimes they find me. My play, I Never Saw Another Butterfly, is a case in point.”

While browsing in a bookstore she picked up the book I Never Saw Another Butterfly because of the poetic title. But the subtitle, Children's Drawings from Terezin Concentration Camp: 1942-1944, captured her imagination and sent her on a long journey of research, writing and publishing. She was moved by the simple drawings, amazed at the poignant attempt of humor, and chilled by children’s honest awareness of their lives.

At the back of the book she read the brief paragraphs that related the few simple facts that was known about each child: the date of birth, the date of the transport to Terezin, and the date the child perished at Auschwitz. She noticed “perished at Auschwitz” recurred over and over in the entries. So when she suddenly when she read the phrase “after the liberation, returned to Prague” written after Raja Englanderova’s paragraph, it surprised her and compelled her to find out more about this survivor. Her curiosity ultimately led to new insights that inspired the play, The Terezin Promise.

The children of Terezin continue to inspire us to remember through their words and pictures.