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Katrin Göring-Eckardt and Christian Wulff in conversation with Marc Hujer
Photo: Julia Parker
In top politics, human moments are rare.
Every word, every gesture, every picture is checked for its effect beforehand.
It seldom happens that a politician falls out of his role in public.
Out of this need, the new book by SPIEGEL author Marc Hujer was born: "Only one person: Politicians and their passions - and what they tell us about them"
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In 2017, Hujer worked on a portrait of the then left parliamentary group leader Sahra Wagenknecht.
Although he accompanied her for weeks, he found Wagenknecht difficult to pin down beyond the political limelight.
"When I saw her after her performances, she practically crawled into herself," says Hujer.
"She built a wall in front of her."
When Hujer approached her, Wagenknecht invited him to go on a bike tour in the Saarland.
"The nice thing about it," says Hujer, "was that Ms. Wagenknecht carried out her training program. In this way I learned a lot more about her than I could have done in ten of her performances."
From the initial plan to write a portrait about Wagenknecht, the idea of a book arose that should capture people apart from top politics.
The bike tour with Wagenknecht was followed by a jaunt in a Porsche with FDP boss Christian Lindner.
Lars Klingbeil took him to the Crossfit, Philipp Amthor to the hunt.
The eleven top politicians portrayed by Hujer also include Green party leader Katrin Göring-Eckardt and former Federal President Christian Wulff.
While Wulff invited the SPIEGEL author to a coffee party in Hanover, Hujer danced the waltz with Karin Göring-Eckardt, who grew up as the daughter of a dance teacher.
At the "SPIEGEL live" event on Sunday in the Deutsches Theater in Berlin, Wulff and Göring-Eckardt spoke with Hujer about being human beyond the political stage.
Ulrich Matthes read two passages from Hujer's book to begin with.
"I've since learned that I have no control over pictures of myself"
Ex-Federal President Christian Wulff
Especially at the beginning of her career, Göring-Eckardt wanted to keep the political out of her private life.
However, she quickly realized that this was not possible.
"It's not private," said the Green leader.
It is extremely important to her to remain true to herself as a politician.
For them a ride on the razor blade: "I can't pretend all day," says Göring-Eckardt.
At the same time, she still has to make sure that she expresses herself carefully and, in case of doubt, always be available for a good photo.
Ex-Federal President Wulff regularly experiences the fact that the political limelight also brings extreme downsides - even eight years after his resignation.
The CDU politician in the Deutsches Theater said his private life was the subject of reports again and again.
"In the meantime I've learned that I have no control over pictures of myself," says Wulff.
There are, however, two areas that he does not accept without hesitation.
"These are photos of my children and my apartment."
Despite the difficult balancing act between the private sphere and the political public, Wulff is also convinced that politicians should maintain authenticity.
Acting is always exposed in the end, says Wulff.
"And if it's the tweet after the talk show: In the end, people always come across as they are."
The day on which Göring-Eckardt decided never to pretend again as a politician was the day on which she was elected as the top candidate for the Green Party.
For a very long time she tried to say what she thought people wanted to hear at party congresses.
"The choice was like a declaration of love from my party to me. They wanted me - and for who I am."
Readers experience Göring-Eckardt in Hujer's book as a woman who realizes early on that attention does not necessarily make the lives of top politicians easier.
Book author Hujer also notices how much burden the public can put on politicians.
Especially in social media today, people work a lot on people, says Hujer.
For this reason, too, the author deliberately gives insights into moments that normally remain hidden in the spotlight of top politics in his book: "Nowadays you quickly forget that there are still people behind politicians."
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