Moritz in der Litfaßsäule (1983)

Nine-year-old Moritz Zack likes to take things slowly. He enjoys life and looks at everything very closely. Moritz also has a great deal of imagination, but these are qualities that have little place in everyday life. Everyone around Moritz is always rushing. The Zack family is large: besides his mother and father, Moritz has three sisters. His father is a savings bank director and a very pedantic man, for whom numbers are everything (“Numbers are the building blocks of life”). A sign reading “Please Do Not Disturb” hangs on the door of his study. No one in the Zack family really understands Moritz; only his Aunt Pia can relate to his outlook on life. Moritz is not especially popular at school, either. In math class, he gets all the problems right, but takes far too long. In art class, he shows off his great imagination, but his teacher disapproves. As far as she is concerned, everything has to be painted realistically. His parents have to sign his poor math grades. Moritz throws his math book into the stream. Because of this constant rejection by those around him, Moritz decides to run away from home. He finds shelter inside a cylindrical advertising column. A talking cat lives there and keeps him company. Like Moritz, the cat has a great deal of imagination, but even the cat can’t get along with Moritz’s slowness. While Moritz is living in the advertising column, a circus comes to town, and he meets a circus girl who works as a tightrope walker. The street sweeper, who stores his brooms in the advertising column, also takes Moritz under his wing. After several conversations with the street sweeper, Moritz finally returns to his family. His aunt has straightened a few things out at home, so the other family members are now able to understand Moritz better, too.