A look back, so to speak, reveals the most important sites in Portbou, the cemetery, and the Walter Benjamin memorial. Between 1934 and 1944, the Spanish town of Portbou on the Costa Brava was a gathering point for German and French emigrants.
The German philosopher and literary critic Walter Benjamin also fled across the Pyrenees to the border town on September 25 and 26, 1940, accompanied by Lisa and Hans Fittko.
Between 1934 and 1944, the Spanish town of Portbou on the Costa Brava was a gathering point for German and French emigrants.
The German philosopher and literary critic Walter Benjamin also fled across the Pyrenees to the border town on September 25 and 26, 1940, accompanied by Lisa and Hans Fittko. From there, Benjamin, who had a visa for the USA, wanted to travel on to Lisbon. Due to a heart condition, he could only make the journey very slowly. The refugees were denied entry to Portbou in accordance with a newly issued Spanish government decree. The Spanish authorities therefore denied him entry and wanted to send him back to France, where he faced arrest by the Gestapo. On the night before his deportation, September 26-27, Benjamin committed suicide by overdosing on morphine at the Hotel "Francia de Portbou." His body was buried in the local cemetery.
In 1989, at the suggestion of Federal President Richard von Weizsäcker, the Federal Foreign Office and the Federal Ministry of the Interior commissioned the Association of Independent Cultural Institutes (AsKI) to plan, organize, and realize a memorial site for Walter Benjamin.