5 comments about Night (Oprah's Book Club).

1. Night by Elie Whitney is surely a book that will keep you entertained. The book is about the story of the holocaust a subject the Author Elie Whitney lived first-hand showing the readers the strong feelings she felt, the dreams she longed for, and the Night she'd rather skip.



2. Night is an absolutely heartbreaking memoir. It short and it is simple. The writing does not flow lyrically and is unembellished. The truth is that none of this matters. The voice of Wiesel....the voice of a man who has suffered loss, pain, and suffering that is incomprehensible to anyone who has not been in his position....makes this book what it is. He writes not only with his own voice, but also with the voices of the millions of other Jewish people who experienced the horrors of the Holocaust. Night is an account of Elie Wiesel's time in the Nazi concentration camps during the Holocaust. Wiesel writes with a voice that recalls loss in it's most tragic sense...loss of family, loss of humanity, loss of belief. It is hard to describe how I felt when reading this account...because as sad and horrified as I found myself while reading, I still know that what I felt was nothing compared to the sadness of the families that were there. No words really seem to be strong enough or raw enough to describe the book. I feel strongly that this should be required reading for everyone. My reason for feeling this way is the same as Wiesel's reason for writing this memoir. Humanity can never be allowed to forget what happened during that dark hour of the world's history. Allowing the world to forget would be a disrespect to the people involved....those who survived as well as those who were murdered at the hands of the Nazis. We are at a point in time where the number of survivors is dwindling quickly. Wiesel felt that this book was needed so that the world would never forget....because to forget would open the door for something like that to happen again. Night serves as a reminder of the terror that happened during the Holocaust...a reminder of our responsibility to prevent such an event from ever happening again



3. I appreciate the quickness in which I received this order. I purchased it for my daughter's summer reading and wanted to make sure that she had ample time in which to read the book. I was afraid that it was going to take a while to receive, but this was not the case. Thank you very much for great customer service !



4. This book speaks only of the facts, your soul will provide the horror and despair.
   
   Like the Elie your left with the skin and bones of what happened. This book should be required reading all over the world



5. The best book about the Holocaust I've ever read. It's short, but it will knock you flat. Hard to believe something that's only about 100 pages can pack such a wallop. Worth its weight in gold.

5 comments about Man's Search for Meaning.

1. I read this book when I was in a very tough place based on the recommendations of a surgeon who unlike many surgeons was interested in my emotional well-being as well. I was hit by a semi-truck while riding my bicycle and spent months in a very difficult place. This book provided some solace although my situation was not nearly as bad as that suffered by the author and the other victims of the holocaust. The author attempts a very difficult task, namely to develop tools for people to find meaning in some unimaginably painful situations. Situations where finding the power to cope and find meaning seem to be pointless. The author describes how he found the emotional strength to survive the concentration camps and come out to be a man who is not broken by circumstances. I couldn't relate to all of his advice but I will remember one thing that the author advised. When in an unbelievably dire and hopeless situation and all other meaning is lost, you can find meaning in suffering and dying with dignity. When all bets are off, you shouldn't lose your humanity.



2. A friend recommended this book after a discussion of "character motivation" in science fiction. I am so glad he did. Frankl was a psychiatrist working on a theory of what motivated mankind when he was thrown in a Nazi concentration camp. He survived in large part because he had something to live for--the publication of his work. The first part of the book details survival within the concentration camp. This part alone is worth the book's price. Unlike Hollywood depictions of camps, he shows what the inmates actually had to do in order to survive (they would do just about anything not to be on a "list") and he even shows the occasional humanity of some of the guards, even, amazingly, the final commandant of his camp.
   
   The second part of the book is a brief summary of Frankl's theories called logotherapy. I can't say I'm an expert on this; he published over 20 volumes on the subject. But what I read here is fascinating. In summary, he believes that man's search for meaning is his primary motivation, unlike Freudian psychology which teaches that man's search for pleasure is his primary motivation.
   
   I plan to reread this book regularly. Truly inspirational.



3. This book is a must read for anyone in the field of psychology, and anyone in the field of life...everyone. Frankl intersperses his experiences in the concentration camp with an exploration of psychology and resilience in the face of the worst circumstances known to mankind. The existential results of his explorations and thoughts are incredible, and they are balm to anyone suffering a psychic or a circumstantial wound... that we have a will to find meaning as human beings. The final lines of the book before the postscript sum up the state of mankind: "...man is that being who invented the gas chambers of Auschwitz; however, he is also that being who entered those gas chambers upright..." and like the rest of the book, use a straightforward prose to convey the richest of ideas.



4. I have read this book many, many times. These are the words I live by. If I was told that I could only own one book for the rest of my life, this would be it. Viktor Frankl's harrowing testimony of surviving in a concentration camp seems incomprehensible. Even more unbelievable is the attitude he adopts during his struggle as he remains apart from his family, starving, cold, and forced to perform hard labor with no relief in sight. Through it all, he decides that even though his body is being held captive, he is still free to control his mind and his attitude.
   
   When he is ultimately liberated from the concentration camp, rather than be bitter and remorseful, he uses his tragic experiences as a basis for logotherapy, a counseling theory that helps people to find meaning in their adversity. He also influences a generation of existential psychotherapists including another favorite writer of mine, Irvin Yalom. This is an incredible book that significantly altered my life and way of thinking. I recommend it to everyone.



5. I had to read this book for a class, but it turned out to be a very interesting and good book to read.

5 comments about Maus I: A Survivor's Tale: My Father Bleeds History.

1. Despite the countless books and films on the Holocaust, those of us who have thankfully never faced these horrors still struggle to understand what happened. It is easier to become numbed by it all. The brilliance of Maus is that it recasts and distills a seemingly over-familiar story into a more manageable one, a son struggling to understand his Father's life, though this in no way diminishes the horrors and struggles that occurred. And any thoughts that a graphic format somehow cheapens the message should be discarded. The pictures at times say far more than words could; such as those of crowds of doomed Jews (the mice) herded to their fate by the Nazis (the cats).
   
   This is a valuable and well told story.



2. The book was in very good condition and it came in very fast, within one week.



3. Maus is one of the captivating page turners I've every laid eyes upon. The story is Art Spiegelman the author writing his fathers tale and what exactly was involved in surviving the holocaust.



4. Art Spiegelman's critically-acclaimed graphic novel chronicles both his father Vladek's misadventures in Hitler's Europe and a rocky relationship between father and son. Depicting the Nazis as cats and the Jews as mice (and the Polish as pigs, a hot-button topic in an already controversial piece), Spiegelman's illustrations actually gives "Maus" the type of appeal that couldn't be achieved in any other medium except this one, as well as lure readers who wouldn't have picked up the comic otherwise. The story itself reels you in but "Prisoner on the Hell Planet," Spiegelman's comic-within-a-comic about his late mother, offers even more insight on Spiegelman and his family history despite its contrast with the main story. This is truly the stuff survival stories are made of.
   
   This comic is unrated: Violence, Adult Language, Adult Situations.



5. I really thought that in this point in my life I had learned all there was to know about the Holocaust. I've been to the museums, seen the movies, seen survivors speak, and studied the awful events in school. I didn't expect to gain a new sense of understanding from this survivors tale.
   
   Maus I: A Survivor's Tale: My Father Bleeds History was a shocking, at times truly disturbing account of a family trying to survive day to day during the Holocaust. This is not a cut and dry tale, it is artfully told through a graphic novel.
   
   I went into this novel wondering "why mice?". As you can see from the cover, the center of the swastika is a cat face. Art Spiegelman has used symbolism to portray a cat and mouse game. The jews are all mice, forever foraging for food and shelter, trying to outsmart the cats that want noting more than to destroy them. The use of this idea in his artwork makes the novel that much more interesting.
   
   I imagine that I could learn something new each time I read this book. There is so much depth, and raw descriptions of what occurred to the authors father and his family. It goes one step deeper in showing how it has affected their lives beyond their time struggling to survive the Holocaust.
   
   A powerful and deeply affecting graphic novel that is an absolute must read.

5 comments about Maus II: A Survivor's Tale: And Here My Troubles Began.

1. The book does not pull any punches, and it is particularly honest in its portrayal of the author's difficult relationship with his father who is shown as a rather mean spirited and manipulative old man. The book also examines the author's difficulties in composing the narrative and trying to understand exactly what his father and mother experienced. I recommend these books (or the one combined version here ) to everyone. If you don't think you can take the pain, you can, in this presentation. If you think you've heard it all, you haven't. If you think you'll never forget, just wait. This will ensure it. On an aesthetic level, this book is beautiful. The illustrations are simple and yet show a great eye for perspective.



2. From my blog review:[...]
   
   For those unfamiliar with this project, Maus tells two stories. Predominantly, it is the story of how Vladek Spiegelman survived the Nazi regime and Hitler's concentration camps. Interspersed throughout, though, is a present day depiction of the interaction between Vladek and his son, Art. Art expresses both admiration for, and exasperation with, Vladek. This is, for me, the most meaningful part of Spiegelman's story. We have a habit of reducing history to a one-dimensional existence in our minds. The Jews who were targeted by the Nazis were all pitiable victims, the Nazis were all inhuman monsters, etc. What Spiegelman has done with Maus is show that the survivors were admirable...and that they were much more than that, as well. It turns out, they were also human and got on their children's nerves the same as nearly every other parental generation. Rather than undermining the dignity and resilience of Vladek, Maus makes him more relevant because he's a whole person and not a cardboard cutout.
   
   Spiegelman took an awful chance bringing his father's story to the medium of graphic storytelling in the 1980s. Even in 2009, the same year that a movie adaptation of Alan Moore's Watchmen (long considered unfilmable), the notion of telling of a holocaust survivor's story in comic book form seems destined to offend. The fact that Spiegelman presents ethnicities as animals (i.e., Jews are depicted as mice, Germans as cats, etc.) would seemingly further remove from the story its proper sense of weight. Remarkably, Vladek's story is perhaps even more striking told through Art's presentation. There is, strangely, a heightened sense of humanity throughout "Maus" that I often find absent even in History Channel programs drawing on actual video footage of the described events.
   
   Simply put, I cannot offer a higher recommendation than the one I give to Art Spiegelman's "Maus: A Survivor's Tale." Originally, Maus was serialized in Spiegelman's comic anthology series Raw; I read the two volume collected edition. Since then, the entire work has been collected in a singular volume. Whichever incarnation you find available, I urge you to take the time to read the tale of Vladek Spiegelman.



3. In this second installment of Art Spiegelman's comic, the author continues to chronicle his cantankerous father's tale of survival in Nazi Europe. The comic also follows Art as he is torn between his admiration for Vladek Spiegelman surviving the horrors of the Holocaust, and his frustration with Vladek's failure to survive in present-day America. Once again, Art chalks up a black-and-white comic that is anything but.
   
   This comic is unrated: Violence, Adult Language, Adult Situations.



4. This was an excellent book. I received the first one for Christmas, and completed it within a day.



5. It doesn't get any better than this.}
   It's almost beyond giving it a "review"....Both I and II are so important and so good. An honor to the six million and more.

5 comments about Survival In Auschwitz.

1. this was a great account of a survival story in Auschwitz. yes, there were mistakes in the editing deparment of the book, but to me this didn't take away the suffering Primo Levi must have encountered. i gave it 4 out of five stars due to the badly edited print. otherwise i am recommending this book for the story that is told in this book.



2. This is one of the finest books on the Holocaust I've ever read. Levi writes beautifully - simple, straightforward sentences. No flourishes. As Bellow said, every word is essential. When he describes the various persons he encounters in his memoir, the descriptions are brilliant and memorable.
   
   After finishing "Survival In Auschwitz," I quickly got Levi's next memoir "The Reawakening," which is about the journey he and hundreds of other Italian Jews made back to their homeland after being liberated. This book was also excellent, and covers a part of the Holocaust history that many are unaware of: what happened next to the survivors?
   
   These two books are really a wonder - any person interested in the Holocaust should read them. Anyone who simply enjoys a well--written memoir should also read these two books.



3. When humans are placed in environments similar to those of the concentration camps created by Germany in World War II, the currency becomes calories, clothing and shelter in that order. Survival is based on getting enough food, oftentimes by having others die or be denied. Every crumb becomes important; over time saving and consuming them is literally the difference between life and death.
   Primo Levi was in his mid twenties, a chemist and an Italian Jew when the war broke out. At first, Italian Jews were relatively safe, that changed as the war dragged on and Germany and the Nazi philosophy grew to dominate the European continent. Captured and deported in 1943, Levi was transported to Auschwitz, where he struggled to survive until the German guards fled and the Russians arrived. This is his story and like all others, his survival was based almost totally on luck and skill. Those skills were due to his ability to quickly shift from a normal, rational world to one of harsh and brutal reality. His luck held as at any time, a whim of a guard could have sent him on the journey that ended with his exiting up a chimney.
   Levi describes his life in hell in great detail, yet with a surprising detachment, almost as if he was engaged in an open and candid conversation about something more normal. It is a stark reminder to everyone that it was a time of great brutality and demonstrates how far away from history and reality the Holocaust deniers really are.



4. In the book Survival in Auschwitz, Primo Levi paints a detailed picture about living as a Jew in fascist Northern Italy and then being transferred to the concentration camp at Auschwitz. By 1943, the Nazis had moved south and set up holding camps around Italy to detain political prisoners and those of the Jewish nationality until they could be transported to established concentration camps such as Auschwitz and Dachau. This book depicts what happened to Levi after his arrest in 1943. Along with 650 others, he was loaded into a freight train for a four-day journey without food or water and without the liberty to leave the train at anytime. Upon their arrival at the camp of Auschwitz, Poland, the first of a precession of selections took place. The German SS Soldiers separated those they deemed capable of work from those they deemed incapable, such as women, children and elderly. Only 135 of the 650 from Levi's train were admitted into Auschwitz, the other 515 went immediately to the gas chambers. Levi recalled with remarkable accuracy the humiliation and confusion felt as he was forced to assimilate into his new surroundings. The food rations were too insufficient to stave off the hunger. Thousands of others around him were suffering and unavoidably dying as a result of this insufficient food supply. Although he was new to the camp, his experiences with others and his own observations told him that the Germans militant nature was at its worst. In order to outlive the war and survive, he found ways to maintain the illusion of usefulness with the least possible exertion. Any protest or disobedience from prisoners ended swiftly with beatings and death.
   
   Levi described how many of the prisoners, after long hours of manual labor, would gather in a corner of the camp for a market. They would trade rations and stolen goods. Such goods as a spoon or buttons were as valuable as gold. The market followed all the classical economic laws. This seemed to show the ability of people to live and think and work in the most adverse of conditions. Inside the barbed wire, the prisoners had created their own social and economical world in order to endure. Primo Levi seems to write as a means in which he could express the physical trauma that he experienced as a survivor of Auschwitz and its emotional consequences. He recalls for the reader the challenges that he faced on a daily and hourly basis to meet the basic needs necessary to remain alive. Levi depicts his time as a prisoner with a straightforward and narrative approach and with an almost unemotional tone that often disguises the horror of what he is describing.
   
   Walter S. Zapotoczny Jr.
   Freelance Writer
   Author of For the Fatherland



5. this is about the most vivid description of the camps. the only problem i had was the very poor editorial work with frequent misspellings and/or wrong words or spaces in words where they do not belong. this became distracting at times despite the intensity of the story.

5 comments about Maus : A Survivor's Tale : My Father Bleeds History/Here My Troubles Began/Boxed.

1. Considered one of the most ground-breaking "graphic novels" ever done - a term which had arguably been launched some years earlier with Will Eisner's book A Contract With God - Art Spiegelman's MAUS adopts a highly charicatured, "comic-book-like" visual expression, something which may puzzle the reader at first, as the story presented is as serious as can be. However, much like Eisner, Spiegelman makes use of his charicatured style in a way that does not appear distracting or confusing, but rather attributes the story a well-constructed satirical flavor. Moreover, by being almost painstakingly minimalistic with the facial features of the animal-drawn characters, Spiegelman makes it all the more inevitable for the reader to identify with them, which certainly is important...though far from a merry experience.
   
   Alternating between current times (1970's-80's) and the past (1930's-40's), Art Spiegelman tells the tale of his Jewish parents' unimaginable struggles and experiences during World War II, as well as the years he spent writing what was eventually to become this book, his father Vladek serving as his major source. Both Vladek and Art's mother did survive the Holocaust, after having lost most family members, but the impact which the experiences left upon them was devastating, resulting in the eventual suicide of Art's mother. Art depicted his feelings of guilt following this last tragedy in an underground cartoon included here, which made me burst out in tears (I tried to keep it down as I was at an airport while reading, but it was hard). That was far from the only time. Perhaps even more heartbreaking than the horrifying depictions of the Holocaust and the times leading up to it, is to be told so frankly that these experiences did not make the few relation bonds that were left in the Spiegelman-family any closer; rather the contrary, it seems. By the time Art began the project of MAUS, his father was more or less a nervous wreck, suspicious of nearly everyone, including his new wife. Art is very honest with his own insecurities as to how to relate to his unhappy father, and the two often seems to have a hard time getting along. The author's use of metaphors is effective and often thought-provoking, but not hard to grasp; one incident which is often referred to has the aging Vladek refusing to give a colored hitchhiker a ride due to the latter's race. The tendency of stereotyping people is hidden within all of us somewhere, either due to unfortunate experiences with particulars of a race or nationality, or out of mere fear or inherited prejudices.
   
   Speaking of metaphors and stereotypes, some reviewers have critized Spiegelman loudly for "stereotyping" people by depicting them physically as animals in the book, particularly in the case of Polish people being drawn as pigs. However, I urge you to look more closely. It can be argued that Spiegelman makes use of the stereotyping of people for which Goebbles was famous (or infamous), but a thorough reading of MAUS should make it quite clear that the author refuses to let these stereotypes affect how he presents people as individuals. To grossly oversimplify: there are good Poles here and there are bad Poles here, and there are good Jews here and there are bad Jews here. Spiegelman presents people as people, DESPITE their disguises as animals which Goebbles, among others, once threw upon them.
   
   MAUS remains a must-read.



2. this has to be the most boring book I've ever read. It was only purchased, because my kids school assigned it as summer reading.



3. A great graphic novel (this version is Maus I and II) that describes the story of the author's father and his experiences before, during and after the holocaust. I highly recommend it as an interesting personal approach to the topic. It's not by any means a historically accurate portrayal of the time, but rather one man's interpretation and recollection of his life. (Spiegelman addresses this a couple of times during the course of the story.)



4. Even though this media CD-ROM is vintage 1995, it runs quite well on my version of Win XP, when the other CD component(s) is/are installed, namely Quicktime. I even may have been previously able to install it on a Vista laptop.
   
   The multimedia aspects are interesting, but my primary purpose was viewing it as a simple alternative to the print edition, haven gotten a library copy of this CDRom, which includes images from both books, before getting the 2nd book.
   
   Annoying is that the images are too small AND they need to be "scrolled". I wonder if currently some sort of tweaking could improve this as things stand.
   
   I think it would be great if this product could be reissued to contemporary standards!



5. I read this book in my senior english class ( I was blessed to have a teacher who looked outside the recommended reading list). Here I am 4 years later and I find both Maus 1 & 2 on my bookshelf. I can't say that I've read another graphic novel before or one since, however I loved everything about Maus. I understand most of the 2 and 1 star ratings come from the depiction of Poles are Pigs. While I can understand that ( I am 100% polish myself) I think people we are overlooking the fact that the book is written from the point of view of Art's father and it's about the events and people he came across. Art obviously did not write about the Polish people as a race in general but as the individuals his father met in his life. Also, he writes about the kind Poles, such as the governess that took care of Vladek's first son. To enjoy the book you need to look at it for what it is; a beautifully illustrated depiction of a man's journey through the Holocaust. Yes maybe some of the poles are made to seem to be on the Nazi side, but we can't say people like that didn't exist...they did what they had to, to survive. Sure, Maus may be seen as a little biased - it's not a history book, but a book written by a son from stories his father had told him. If Art wrote it so it wouldn't offend anyone, not only would it lose that something special that made me love it, but it couldn't be called a true story.

5 comments about Night.

1. I read "Night" because my son was reading it, for school I think. With so much written now about the Holocaust, few remember that survivors didn't want to talk about their experience in the early years. Elie Wiesel waited a decade in silence, and then wrote "Night" for the wider public. It is short, terse, factual. A good and well-known introduction to the Holocaust. If you want to know what happened, as experienced by one average European Jewish teenager, start with Night. If you want to know how it could happen, though, you'll have to read much more, for example Hitler's Willing Executioners: Ordinary Germans and the Holocaust
   by Daniel Jonah Goldhagen.



2. The quote from the New York Times on the cover of this book has it exactly right: "a slim volume of terrifying power." Wiesel's retelling of his experiences in the Auschwitz concentration camp is concise and seemingly artless. But the absence of sentimental pathos only makes the story so much more moving, so much more powerful. I first listened to this novel as an audio book some five or six years ago, and the experience was overwhelming. Since then, I've listened to it again perhaps five times, I've read it in the French original twice, and I've read the English translation by Stella Rodway once. I now know it almost by heart. Certain passages from the book would haunt my imagination for weeks, leaving an indelible imprint on my soul. For instance, I feel I know with certainty that I will remember the fate of Moshe the Beadle -- a human being of flesh and blood who once lived and breathed, and whose story is told here in but a few pages -- until my dying day. 'Never shall I forget that night' -- this is a very, *very* powerful book.
   
   For what it is worth, I would recommend this translation rather than the new one by Marion Wiesel, the author's wife. However, I say this without actually having read the newer translation, so I should probably admit that my judgment here doesn't carry much weight. I only read the first pages of both books side by side, and this gave me the impression that Rodway's rendition was somehow more poetic, and perfectly accurate when compared with the French version. For instance, Rodway's "I loved his great, dreaming eyes, their gaze lost in the distance." sounds better to me than Marion Wiesel's "As for me, I liked his wide, dreamy eyes, gazing off into the distance." (he's talking about Moshe the Beadle), and the French does have the verb 'love.' But perhaps I only prefer the earlier translation because this was the one I first encountered and grew attached to. Nevertheless, since it seems likely now that most new readers will first turn to the translation endorsed by Oprah's Book Club, I think there is at least a point in exhorting people not to forget about the earlier version.



3. When a teenager, Elie Wiesel was taken from his home, and he and his family were put in a series of concentration camps over several years. Night is the haunting record of that experience, as bleakly unflinching a memoir as has ever been written. Few can know the horrors of not only spending teenage years in such a place but also seeing family members and many others die and countless others suffer. Needless to say, Wiesel's own plight was also tragically great, and he unsurprisingly lost both innocence and faith. The experience touched him so deeply that he was unable to write of it for over a decade. When he finally did, he had great difficulty getting published; the events were still very close, and the world wanted to forget rather than being reminded. However, when published in 1960, Night was an international sensation, reawakening interest in the Holocaust and all it stands for. It was not only a literary triumph but the first step in Wiesel's core belief that we must always remember the Holocaust so nothing like it ever happens again.
   
   The book remains undeniably compelling, a masterpiece on many levels. Perhaps most immediately, it is a stark depiction of evil's height, showing humanity at its worst. This is valuable in every sense from philosophical to sociological but above all in destroying hollow optimism epitomized in the belief that things will take care of themselves and all will work out for the best. Night leaves no doubt that, left unchecked, human evil grows exponentially; it is our duty to curb it, and the awareness raised by such works is a very important part of this. Second, it is an invaluable historical document, one of the best - most thorough and readable - primary sources of the Holocaust's unparalleled miseries. As such, it is one of the darkest works ever - all the more so in being true; even the blackest imagination could not conceive such atrocities, which says all that need be said about this aspect of Night and the events it records.
   
   Yet there are several strong senses in which the book is not bleak. First, it is an artistic masterpiece; unwavering honesty and vivid description raise it above mere memoir, putting it with the most harrowing and unforgettable first-person accounts ever. Its biggest strength in this way is unadorned yet highly effective prose. Wiesel has no time for dizzying metaphors, lush descriptions, or other fancy writing; he has a bitter story to tell and tells it as plainly and - in the best way - as simply as possible. This makes it clearer and more memorable than it could ever have been otherwise, forcing us to focus on the events rather than the writing. The story speaks for itself as few can. Though barely one hundred pages, it has more of substance and significance than nearly any other book. The words are few but the implications endless.
   
   Perhaps more fundamentally, though Night is a savage condemnation of human evil, it is also a tribute to human endurance. Like a surprising number of others, Wiesel survived the Holocaust despite everything, showing just how far human beings can be pushed and live. Such determination and perseverance is truly incredible, a testament to the indomitable human spirit that is at least as astonishing in its way as the evil that confronted it and far more awe-inspiring. Wiesel not only lived but, in a long career starting with Night, has admirably devoted his life to exposing the Holocaust's monstrosities to guard future ages against recurring evil.
   
   Night is a profoundly important document in this and many other ways, a must for anyone even remotely interested in the Holocaust, World War II, Judaism, or the depths to which humanity can sink - as well as, in one sense at least, all that it can rise above. It is nothing less than one of the most important and valuable books of all-time. Though a very painful read, everyone should read it if only to see just how painful life can be - and hopefully to avoid passing the pain on to those lucky enough to have been born after the nightmares it faithfully records.
   
   As for this edition, it has a short Preface and a somewhat longer and older Introduction by Francois Mauriac, who knew Wiesel. Both give some interesting background on Wiesel and the book but are not revelatory. Anyone who comes across this will get a quality version, but some of the later ones, which have Wiesel Prefaces, are probably better.



4. THis book was very powerful and moving while at the same time disturbing. I had my children read it. I want them to really understand what took place during the Holocaust and to see the resilence of people. This should be required reading in history class.



5. The beginning of this book bored me so it took me about 1 1/2 hours to read the first chapter. I was surprised that Elie described everything with lots of detail. It also surprised how brutal people were during the Holocaust. In the end I thought this was a pretty good book and would recommend it to anyone willing to learn a lot about the Holocaust.

5 comments about Anne Frank: The Diary of a Young Girl.

1. A wonderful book for young adults and adults......filled with information on how the people lived and made it thru this terrible time. Especially the young Anne Frank what courage she had.



2. This is not your middle school edition.She really explores how it is becoming a teenager.I'm in awe of her writing skills.I would challenge today's teenagers to write so eloquent. A somber read knowing the outcome.



3. I had that question. But mostly, I wrote this review to cure a superstition. There were 666 reviews so I had to leave something...
   
   
   Your welcome. lol



4. Of course, I read the first published, "Diary of Anne Frank" in high school. It made me feel like I wasn't all alone with my feelings. I first bought the Complete and Unabridged book for my husband's niece when she turned fourteen. She loved it and still owns it. I also read the book at that time and it filled in gaps that I didn't realize were missing until they were added back. I liked how she spoke of her sexual feelings because in a very real sense, sex is one of the most important components of continuing the human species. That there are those who feel squeamish about speaking about it is a testament to beliefs about keeping some things "private" when speaking about them will rid teenagers of myths they may believe. Anyway, I bought this copy for my friend's daughter who will be turning fifteen in September and I am hoping she will enjoy it as much as my husband's niece and I did. And all the millions of girls who have.



5. I've been in love with Anne Frank since I was in Junior High and we read the play based on her diary. But the play is an amuse-bouche, the tantalizing bite that precedes a meal. In the Diary itself, Anne truly comes alive. Her words, the way she wrote them. When she was alive and hiding from the greatest horror man has ever known. And she never lost her courage, or her belief in the nobility of man. I cried and I laughed. But more than that, I felt a growing wonder and respect as I read her words and realized that during this period she was growing from a precocious child into an intelligent woman of depth and understanding.
   
   Let no generation ever forget. Let no generation ever stop reading the story of the young girl in hiding. And let no generation lose their ultimate faith in the goodness of mankind, as she never lost hers. Thank you, Anne, for giving us a living document of a beautiful spirit.

5 comments about All But My Life.

1. All I can say, is I could not hardly put this brilliantly written Holocaust Survivor book down.It is so fascinating, once again to see how she survived by her wits alone, at times. What a smart girl...takes you from girlhood to a few years later, then a brief synopsis of her present life.
   I would highly recommend this book. She had to wear wooden shoes, too small for her, and tie rags onto her feet, starved, smacked around, beat up as well a time or two.I just simply loved this book, or I wouldnt have taken the time to recomment it to you all.Thank you , and have a great day shpping at the most wonderful place, Amazon.com!



2. This is a wonderful memoir of an exceptional woman that endured hardship and loss in the Holocaust that I can't even begin to comprehend!I bought it to take on vacation and made the mistake of reading the first few pages when I received it and couldn't put it down. Finished it two weeks before I left. Even when I wasn't reading it I thought about what she was going through and couldn't wait to get back to it. My utmost respect and praise to the Author!
   
   A MUST READ!!!!
   
   I can't begin to imagine that anyone could do these things to another human being.



3. As with some other reviewers, I watched the author's interview at the Holocaust Museum, and her story and effective presentation stood out even among the other gut-wrenching tales. I had never heard of her, but haven't forgotten. The book cannot disappoint even high expectations. This must be a classic among Holocaust memoirs.
   
   The author is so matter-of-fact in her prose, without the excess passion or self-absorption that can spoil memoirs. Of course, she had intense passion for her family and in her will to survive, realizing that she was both incredibly lucky and the beneficiary of her own strength. She didn't need to rant about the Nazis, as the stories themselves and personal vignettes did that very powerfully on their own.
   
   The length at 200+ pages fits well. There was no need to expand the story with more detail, as interesting as that could be, or you'd risk a mind-numbing level where the volume overwhelmed the insights. That some other "girls" survived most of the book added continuity and breadth beyond one author's solo determination.



4. Since I watched the movie "Anne Frank the Whole Story", I have been fascinated with the holocaust in an unusual way. I wanted to learn more. This book has to be one of the most touching and moving books that I have ever read. I could not put it down. I read it in about 6 days. It made me appreciate my life and have respect for it and others. It is an eye opener in realizing how strong the human spirit can be. As I read it I was amazed at what the human mind and body can endure. Please read this book and your life will be forever changed. You will never live and view life the same again.



5. There are a few books that everyone in this world needs to read. This is one of them. Also Charlotte's Web. But please read this book. If you can't afford to buy it, I'll send you my copy. peacerun@gmail.com

5 comments about The Drowned and the Saved.

1. This is Primo Levi's last reflections on the Holocaust. His most famous book, published shortly after his experience in it, is entitled in the English language version, Survival In Auschwitz This collection of essays was written almost 40 years later, shortly before his death. It will never be definitely determined if he committed suicide in 1987, but the possibility that he may have adds poignancy to the various passages in these essays in which he discusses the suicide of other survivors of the Holocaust, including his friend, and fellow intellectual, Jean Améry. In the essay fittingly entitled "Stereotypes," Levi was quite clear about why he felt these essays were necessary: "... the gap that exists and grows wider every year between things as they were `down there' and things as they are represented by the current imagination fed by approximative books, films, and myths. It slides fatally toward simplification and stereotype, a trend against which I would like here to erect a dike."
   
   To that end, one of the very strongest essays in this collection is entitled "The Gray Zone." Levi says "It is a gray zone, poorly defined, where the two camps of masters and servants both diverge and converge. This gray zone possesses an incredibly complicated internal structure and contains within itself enough to confuse our need to judge." The author goes on to describe a system - a `primitive' one, to use his word, where humans have regressed towards earlier societal models, where the first blows and kicks that a new arrival receives are all too often delivered by their fellow inmates, some with the status of "Capos," as opposed to the individuals who are normally considered the ultimate in sadistic behavior, the SS. As Levi says: "Vying for prestige also came into play, a seemingly irrepressible need in our civilization: the despised crowd of seniors was prone to recognize in the new arrival a target on which to vent its humiliation, to find compensation at his expense, to build for itself and at his expense a figure of a lower rank on whom to discharge the burden of the offenses received from above." As Levi describes, much of the experience of a new arrival would parallel that of a new conscript to basic army training, including the haircut. In the same essay there is an excellent depiction of Chaim Rumkowski, who was the self-styled leader of the Lodz ghetto, before he too was deported to the concentration camps, or, to use the author's word, the "Lager."
   
   Should the Holocaust be capitalized, and none of the others, such as the Armenian or Cambodian? To Levi's credit, he does refer to the others; and in particular mentions the auto-genocide in Cambodia a few times. But Levi, perhaps naturally, leans towards the primacy of the evil of the one that almost killed him. I consider this a sterile debate, and often think of the young soldier in the movie "Hearts and Minds" who took some form of solace in stating that he lost both his legs in one of the "largest ambushes of the war." And I compare that to Remarque's treatment of his protagonist, who died on a day that was so quiet and still that the high command confined itself to a single sentence: Erich Maria Remarque's All Quiet on the Western Front (Bloom's Modern Critical Interpretations) The evil has occurred to the individual; does the magnitude of the context make it more or less tragic? For Americans, the greater responsibility should lay with the holocaust that we helped provoke rather than the one we helped to stop.
   
   The essays are only 200 pages long, but are so rich in insights. Levi stresses that those that survived in the Lagers invariably were in some "special circumstances," as he was, both being a chemist, and having contracted scarlet fever just as all the others were forced on a death march prior to the liberation of the camp by the Soviet Army. He has an entire essay on the gratuitous "useless" violence in the camps. The author has the eye for the telling, and often times ironic details: for example, the Jews were forbidden from playing music that was composed by Aryans, yet, since there were no other musicians available, in the camps they were permitted, even compelled, to play the requisite band marches. I found the final section particularly significant: the letters that Levi had received from his German readers, which presented a broad range of responses, from continued rationalizations to compelling sorrow from those with "hands that were clean."
   
   Should be required reading in all our schools. An excellent 5-star plus read.



2. In his final book, Primo Levi returns to the Lagers and the occupation to deliver a series of ruminations on life, love, hardship, pain, brutality, and the essential mystery of living.
   
   Thoughtful, humane and exceedingly intelligent, Levi looks back, considers the fate of friends, foes, nations, letter-writers and everything else and reflects on just how man got to be how we are.
   
   As a Philosophy graduate I am especially grateful to Levi for bringing a fresh, powerful, and deep perspective to the horrors of WWII. Thank you for your remembrance.



3. "The Drowned and the Saved" by Primo Levi, is different in one aspect from his earlier works dealing with his experiences in Auschwitz: in the previous books, he was still an impassioned young man, racing as it was to record his memories and experiences. For later in life, memory can become less exact and true, as he recounts in this book, a collection of reflections and observations about his experiences and what they have to say about that time and humanity in general. "The Drowned and the Saved" is a bibliography of sorts, an examination of one man's search to make sense out of the senseless, to open the eyes of those who were not there, to make sure that this horror is never forgotten, or repeated.
   
   Primo Levi, while Jewish by birth, was agnostic by the time he was taken as a political prisoner to Auschwitz. He survived, thanks in part to his job as a chemist, but was still just as affected by the savagery around him. Levi explores different topics within the Lagers, and while distanced by time and experience, his observations are still cutting. Levi deftly talks of various topics - the useless violence inflicted upon prisoners, the shame that they felt in their situation, how language itself became degraded within the camp system, and how there are grey areas where blame and judgment are not necessarily easy or concrete. Levi closes his book with a look at correspondence he has received from Germans after the translation of "Survival in Auschwitz": almost all of them try to explain away their lack of knowledge and courage, and while Levi may be able to forgive, he isn't able to forget.
   
   Primo Levi and other writers who share their experiences about the Holocaust are often referred to as witnesses: but Levi insists that the true witnesses of the darkest horrors are those who did not survive. It is truly impossible to know what their experiences were like because they are not here to tell. Levi also admonishes the easy and placating stereotypes that have arisen in recent times, offering that the actions of the Germans and the world during WWII cannot be judged by the standards of today. "The Drowned and the Saved" is an informative and thought-provoking book, offering insights into lessons that should never be forgotten, but existing in a world where this is a very real and terrifying possibility.



4. How does anyone explain the murder of hundreds of thousands by other human beings? Whether it's Armenians by Turks, Poles by Germans, Soviets by Soviets, Rwandans by Rwandans, Cambodians by Cambodians, Croats by Serbs, Serbs by Croats, Bosniaks by Serbs, Darfuris by Sudanese; the cruelty involved in the murders far outweights the "reasons" for the crimes.
   
   No matter how angry one is with his fellow human beings, the systematic murder of ones neighbors is unfathomable. The murders in the ex-Yugoslavia are as random and systematic as those by Nazi Germany. Ethnic cleansing (to give it a title like a TV commercial) is no less horrendous than religious zealousness. To search out you fellow human being, and then murder them without rhyme or reason, except for their religion or the language they speak (is Serbo-Croatian that different from Croato-Serbian?) or the religious hierarchy they follow seems as absurd as to murder all the left-handed blonds with blue eyes.
   
   Primo Levi spent the forty years after the Holocaust trying to fathom how one (anyone) survived in the "Lagers" (his name for the Camps). He was 'lucky' in that he was taken in 1944, when some prisoners were kept for their 'knowledge' as opposed to the immediate extermination of all who came off the trains. But even then, how does one live with the knowledge of what one human being can do to another, sometimes out of no other reason than boredom?
   
   What is interesting in this volume is his discussion of the reaction of 'everyday' Germans, to the original volume, "Survival in Auschwitz". While most of his letters of from 'young Germans', born during and after The War, those by the older Germans are most enlightening. This book is important in the unbridled descriptions or the uselessness of torments for no use other than the pleasure of the torturers.
   
   Zeb Kantrowitz



5. Just a note to correct the Amazon book description that states that Levi committed suicide. He did not. He fell to his death down a staircase in his apartment house.