In this February 1932 newsreel segment, the renowned German playwright and author Gerhart Hauptmann (1862-1946) read aloud a statement before boarding a passenger liner in Bremerhaven for a lecture tour of the United States. Hauptmann, serving as an unofficial representative of the German literary world, planned to use his trip to commemorate the centennial of Johann Wolfgang von Goethe’s death and to solidify cultural ties with one of Germany’s most important international partners. During his stay in the U.S., Hauptmann met with President Herbert Hoover and the author and disability-rights activist Helen Keller; received an honorary doctorate from Columbia University; and gave talks at Harvard, Johns Hopkins, and George Washington Universities. His statement’s reference to Goethe’s writings as a gift from Germany to the world highlighted the nation’s reputation as one of poets and thinkers [Dichter und Denker], a peaceful and lofty image for a country that had worked hard to rebuild its international image after the war. Hauptmann made an apt ambassador for this task. He won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1912, in recognition of his realism, usage of German vernacular, and frank portrayal of those on the margins of society. Just one year after this trip, the Nazi Party seized power, and Hauptmann chose to remain in Germany, perhaps due to his old age and attachment to his native Silesia. He later joined the Reichstheaterkammer, a theater organization overseen by Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels, which somewhat tarnished his post-1945 reputation.