The European Union is a community whose strength lies in the indi- viduality and uniqueness of its member states and people. The Hanse Book Project was initiated in the year 2019 to offer young people who will eventually shape and drive the destiny of Europe a unique experience that allows them to affirm their individuality in a collective exercise.
Let’s elaborate on what is at stake here and how we expect to achieve the aforementioned objective.
The idea: students from different Hanseatic cities in Europe col- laborate in writing a historical novel located temporally in the Han- seatic era. Each story is expected to demonstrate that in the EU too individuality means both wealth and strength.
Emmerich and schools in other Hanseatic cities showed a lot of enthusiasm about this book project. The idea was immediately em- braced and duly fleshed out through conversations over telephone, e- mail and video conferences. Most importantly, though, mutual visits brought the participants together and helped forge an active community in which they got to know and appreciate each other at a deeper level, recognising the different individual strengths. The exercise of working together but with individual approaches, thus conveying the key message envisaged by the project. The young writers did not forget to learn about the other cities that are home to their fellow collabo- rators and learn about their exciting histories. You would be able to identify such places in these stories.
First, the teachers in each Hanseatic city worked with their students to come up with the principal characters in the particular story. These characters were then incorporated into a plot. Thereafter, the young writers worked on producing exciting narratives, incorporating historical facts they had obtained while researching the histories of their respective cities. The exercise helped them strengthen the ways in which they identified with their cities.

Throughout the process the participants were provided relevant information about the objectives and the current status of the book project through the website,www.europe-in-school.eu.
In order to emphasise the individual and collective, the students finally translated their work into languages of other participants, providing links to the same. Hanse Links, the linguistic sponsor has made it possible for all these texts to be read via their website www.hanse-links.eu.
It must be mentioned that Mr Klaus Puschaddel, the City Director of Lübeck, who learned about this International book project at the Hansetag 2000 in Neuss, was so enthusiastic that he spontaneously offered his patronage to the Hansebunch Project.
It is particularly pleasing that Stiftung Der Sparkasse zu Lübeck provided financial support to cover printing costs and also to attract new participants for the second volume that is envisaged. Other Ger- man and English Hanseatic cities have already expressed interest. Alt- hough no longer a part of the EU, the English cities continue to be part of the Hanseatic League. As the saying goes, ‘draw the circle, but not too small,’ for this is a community that wants to grow and develop positively with fidelity to the notion that each country must be allowed to pursue individual priorities given the fact that diversity and indivi- duality make communities stronger.
The students are eager to see which Hanseatic cities will join the project in order to launch a follow-up volume of ‘Hanseatic Links.’ You can obtain all information related to new developments from the website mentioned above.

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