Holocaust Memoirs
By Frederic Krome -- Library Journal, 3/15/2009
Traditionally, Holocaust memoirs have been either contemporary diaries from the era, memoirs drawn from diaries or notes, or oral history interviews from recollection or personal reconstruction. Recently, new subgenres have appeared, such as memoirs in which children of survivors integrate an account of a journey—literal and historiographic—as they reconstruct a parent's wartime experiences.
Although the Holocaust memoir form is subject to some pitfalls, such as compression of chronology and factual errors, many offer distinct and valuable insights. The starred reviews below will draw readers with their powerful, even unlikely stories, while all collections specializing in this topic will want to acquire the bulk of the titles.—Frederic Krome
Bergman, Eugene. Survival Artist: A Memoir of the Holocaust. McFarland. Jul. 2009. c.275p. bibliog. index. ISBN 978-0-7864-4134-1. pap. $35. AUTOBIOGBergman's family lived for a time in the "Aryan" section of Warsaw, his survival dependent upon the black market to earn a living. Of particular interest is Bergman's account of walking among the general population and the fear this engendered in him. His memoir suffers, however, from one of the classic problems of reconstituted stories: he describes events, emotions, and decisions that he was not in fact a party to at the time, making this a memoir with an overlay of postwar details.—Frederic Krome, Univ. of Cincinnati Clermont Coll.
Bitton-Jackson, Livia. Saving What Remains: A Holocaust Survivor's Journey Home To Reclaim Her Ancestry. Lyons: Globe Pequot. Aug. 2009. c.164p. index. ISBN 978-1-59921-546-4. $21.95. AUTOBIOG
This veteran Holocaust memoirist writes of returning to her past, in this case not the camps or ghettos. For Bitton-Jackson (history, emerita, Lehman Coll., CUNY; I Have Lived a Thousand Years), all that remained was a cemetery, now in the Czech Republic and about to be flooded. Her journey to rescue her grandparents' remains for reinterment in Israel reminds readers that in retrieving the physical remnants of the past we will confront many forces.—Frederic Krome, Univ. of Cincinnati Clermont Coll.
Buergenthal, Thomas. A Lucky Child: A Memoir of Surviving Auschwitz as a Young Boy. Little, Brown. Apr. 2009. c.240p. photogs. ISBN 978-0-316-04340-3. $24.99. AUTOBIOGAs a boy at Auschwitz, Buergenthal apparently avoided its killing process because of administrative chaos but was separated from his parents. His story is especially interesting for its detail of his postwar experiences, reconnecting with prisoners who'd helped him, and living in an orphanage in Eastern Europe until his mother found him. Buergenthal regards the Holocaust as a moral compass for his life's path as a judge on the International Criminal Court in The Hague. [See Prepub Alert, LJ 1/09.]—Frederic Krome, Univ. of Cincinnati Clermont Coll.
den Hartog, Kristen & Tracy Kasaboski. The Occupied Garden: A Family Memoir of War-Torn Holland. Thomas Dunne Bks: St. Martin's. May 2009. c.336p. photogs. ISBN 978-0-312-56157-4. $24.95. HIST
This is the story of daily life in Holland during the Nazi occupation as experienced by the authors' grandfather and grandmother. They try to tie local events to broader national events, but the linkage sometimes seems strained. Yet being able to witness the travails and coping strategies of ordinary citizens under Nazi occupation is valuable in itself, which makes this a useful addition to the literature.—Frederic Krome, Univ. of Cincinnati Clermont Coll.
Kramer, Clara with Stephen Glantz. Clara's War: One Girl's Story of Survival. Ecco: HarperCollins. Apr. 2009. c.352p. photogs. ISBN 978-0-06-172860-0. $25.99. AUTOBIOGBased on her wartime diary, which she kept while hiding in a basement in Poland, Kramer's book vividly recalls the tensions within her hidden community after the Nazis overtook the town of Zolkiew in 1942. Of particular interest are revelations about the family who hid the Kramers, particularly how an anti-Semitic Polish householder demonstrated great courage in shielding Jews in his basement. Kramer, in her eighties, now lives in New Jersey.—Frederic Krome, Univ. of Cincinnati Clermont Coll.
Raphael, Lev. My Germany. Terrace: Univ. of Wisconsin. Apr. 2009. c.224p. ISBN 978-0-299-23150-7. $26.95. AUTOBIOGRaphael contributes again to the genre of second-generation Holocaust literature in which he is a pioneer. In this poignant memoir, he takes readers on his journey to reconcile with the past. Having grown up in New York with survivor parents who hated Germans and everything German, Raphael is nervous when given the opportunity to do a book tour in Germany for his book Secret Anniversaries of the Heart. With much trepidation, he visits the places that haunted his family and caused him to bear the burden of their pain. True to his other works, his book is powerful and captivating to the end, painting vivid pictures of his parents' suffering, his hatred of Germany, and eventually his healing and reconciliation.—Holly S. Hebert, Rochester Coll., MI
Reiss, Johanna. A Hidden Life: A Memoir of August 1969. Melville House. 2009. 217p. ISBN 978-1-933633-55-8. $24.95. AUTOBIOG
This is a recounting by Reiss of how her return to Holland in 1969 (to research and write what became her Newberry Honor book, The Upstairs Room, a fictionalized account of her Holocaust experience) intersected with new personal and global tumults. During her return to Holland, her husband committed suicide in New York, without leaving a note. For Reiss, many seering and unresolved issues intersected, making for sobering reading.—Frederic Krome, Univ. of Cincinnati Clermont Coll.
Venezia, Shlomo with Béatrice Prasquier. Inside the Gas Chambers: Eight Months in the Sonderkommando of Auschwitz. Polity. Apr. 2009. c.202p. tr. by Andrew Brown. photogs. bibliog. ISBN 978-0-7456-4383-0. $22.95. HIST
Few of those assigned to the infamous Sonderkommando of Auschwitz, the unit that disposed of the bodies of gassed prisoners, survived to tell their story. Here is the translated text of a series of interviews with Venezia, a Greek Jew deported to the death camp in 1944. He provides graphic details of the organization of mass murder and his hope not to lose all his humanity in such as environment. Two additional contributed essays provide further important historical context.—Frederic Krome, Univ. of Cincinnati Clermont Coll.
