FORCED ABROAD. JOURNAL OF A
FORCED LABORER

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Initially Jan de Boer was lucky. He managed to escaped the Nazi raid of Rotterdam in November 1944 in which they rounded up young men and deported them to Germany to perform forced labor. For several weeks he and his family managed to survive the extremely cold winter and food shortages in the Netherlands. But on January 8, 1945, he was finally caught and drafted for labor service. That was when his appalling journey into the unknown that was eventually to take him to Munich began. He recorded his experiences every day in his journal, writing about his fear, his homesickness, and the tough working conditions, but also about his determination never to give up. The visual novel Forced Abroad illustrates what the time spent in the forced labor camp meant for Jan and what he was able to do to survive. The interactive app can be downloaded free of charge in the Apple or Google Play Store.

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Forced Abroad. Journal of a Forced Laborer

Forced Abroad. Journal of a Forced Laborer

“Forced Abroad” is based on the original journal entries of Jan Henrik Bazuin, born in Rotterdam in 1925. In 1940 Nazi Germany occupied The Netherlands. When the German Wehrmacht bombed Rotterdam in May of that year, the Bazuin family’s printshop, where Jan probably worked, was destroyed. Four years later the Nazis staged a major raid of Rotterdam in which 52,000 people were deported to work in the German Reich in the space of only two days. Jan initially escaped, probably because he was outside the city helping with the harvest in the east of the country. He began writing a journal in November 1944. His daily entries describe wartime in the occupied city and the ever-worsening famine. He also tells of quarrels with his parents and with his new love, Annie, and later of his experiences in Germany.

Bazuin returned to the Netherlands after the war but he was never able to speak about his experiences. His journal, however, is an important piece of testimony for historical research. It was only discovered by his son Leon in 2001, after Jan Bazuin’s death.

The visual novel is based on the journal entries but also contains fictitious and interactive elements. The experiences of the protagonist, Jan de Boer, are based on those of Jan Bazuin: his deportation from Rotterdam to Munich, the separation from his parents and from his first love. Ultimately, he finds ways to survive in Germany. In his memory album, which users compile while playing the game, historical background information is made available to help understand the story. The illustrations are by the cartoonist Barbara Yelin. The book publication “Jan Bazuin: Tagebuch eines Zwangsarbeiters” (C.H. Beck) was produced in collaboration with Yelin.

Paintbucket Games

The independent studio Paintbucket Games was founded by Jörg Friedrich and Sebastian St. Schulz in 2018. The aim of the studio is to develop video games whose themes are current socio-political issues and seek to create a strong narrative. The first game “Through the Darkest of Times” is about a civilian resistance group during the Nazi period and has won many prizes, including the 2020 German computer game prize in the category “Best Serious Game.” Currently the Paintbucket Games team is working on “Beholder 3,” a sequel to the popular game that simulates the role of a denouncer in a fictitious police state, and on “The Darkest Files”, which is about the legal investigation and trials of Nazi crimes in postwar Germany.

www.paintbucket.de

Barbara Yelin

Barbara Yelin (b. 1977) studied illustration at the University of Applied Sciences Hamburg. Her graphic novels often take the form of research-based visual historical and biographical narratives. She became known internationally for her graphic novel Irmina which is about a woman who becomes a Nazi follower (2014). She draws comics and illustrations for various daily newspapers and has taught at the University of Applied Arts in Vienna and at Grinnell College in the United States. In 2015 she received the Bayerische Kunstförderpreis für Literatur, in 2016 the Max und Moritz-Preis as best German-language comic artist, and in 2021 the Ernst-Hoferichter-Preis für Literatur. Barbara Yelin lives and works in Munich.

www.barbarayelin.de

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FORCED ABROAD. JOURNAL OF A FORCED LABORER

FORCED ABROAD. JOURNAL OF A
FORCED LABORER