The theme of this photo book without taboos is the alienation of man in modern civilization. The crisis in GDR society in the eighties can be seen as the social backdrop.

Gundula Schulze Eldowy shows us mankind as being from the outset a suffering and threatened entity, which is further hindered from finding its true self by the restraints and rules of society, and which exerts violence. There are also lighter moments from life which set the necessary counterpoint, but these are rare upon this walk through Hades, which takes us from the delivery room, the hospital and elderly retirement home, through the factory shop floor and slaughterhouse, to the dancing school and the opera ball.

In all the exterior decay of the cities corresponds to the observed reification of the people portrayed and the individual's yearnings for inner transformation with the political self-liberation of GDR society.