1 comments about Awakening Lives: Autobiographies of Jewish Youth in Poland before the Holocaust.

1. Awakening Lives consists of a dozen or so autobiographies written by Polish Jewish adolescents in the 1930s. These autobiographies, translated from Yiddish, Polish, and Hebrew, are not only extraordinarily moving but also offer an incomparably rich, kaleidoscopic point of entry into the life of Europe's largest, most creative, and most bewilderingly divided Jewish community prior to the Holocaust. Selected from several hundred such autobiographies written for contests in 1934, 1936, and 1939, the essays here capture Polish Jewry in all its variety. Some writers hailed from the wealthy, urbane Polish-Jewish bourgeoisie, while others were raised in the grindingly poor, often broken families which crowded the Jewish slums of Warsaw and Lodz or Poland's increasingly depressed small towns(shtetlelkh). Some were steeped in religious tradition (though many rebelled against it) while other grew up in families which had already embraced an idealized secular European modernity. At the same time, however, the essays reveal the shared predicaments and dilemmas which make this period of Polish Jewish history so fascinating and so important for understanding both the modern Jewish experience and the modern European experience as a whole. In an environment of rising anti-semitism, spiralling economic breakdown, and intensifying political conflict across Europe, the autobiographers grappled with the great political questions of the era and the proper response on the part of Jews, the nature of Jewish identity and culture, and the question of their own future (and whether, indeed, they had one). At the same time, they wrestled with tremendous candor with the intimate questions of selfhood, sexuality, and worldview common to modern childhood and adolescence. The fact that almost all of these writers would be killed in the years that followed will no doubt haunt many readers and, perhaps, discourage others; the frankness of these autobiographies may disturb those who idealize Jewish life in the old world. But I know of no more moving, gripping, or honest way of encountering the real, complex individuals who made up that world.

2 comments about Shared Lives: Growing Up in 50s Cape Town.

1. This is a lovely, deeply meaningful book. Deeply meaningful because female friendship is so rarely explored in literature, and in non-fiction, rarely explored without a kind of insistence: "See, this is better than--or as good as--any heterosexual relationship." The love between girls who grow up together in an insular society is simply and matter-of-factly rendered, as is the importance of friendship among women. Indeed, there is no hint of special pleading in this book; the author is a feminist, but not striving to make a case for feminism, nor for any other isms. She is a Jew, but doesn't bend over backwards either to explain Jewishness to others, or to signal tribal themes to Jewish readers. She is from South Africa, but, though she writes of apartheid with clear moral repulsion, does not apologize for her native origins, or for her love of South Africa's landscape and some of its people. She is an academic but does not try the lay reader with terminology or scholarly arcana. Above all, she brings to life a woman anyone would have wanted to know, her lively, passionate, charming friend Romy, who died too young. I gobbled the book up in two days, and found myself close to tears at the end.



2. This book, written by ex-South African Lyndall Gordon captures a time and place like no-one ever will. Through her story you meet Romy, Rosie and Lyndall and transport yourself to a different era. However - whatever the logistical differences there may be, the lesson you learn is that being human is a universal and ageless condition.

5 comments about Fragments: Memories of a Wartime Childhood.

1. I read the book and believed it.NOW IT TURNS OUT TO BE FICTION!!!!
   MORE AMMUNITION FOR THE HOLOCAUST DENIERS.
   IF AMAZON IS TO SELL...PLACE IT IN FICTION PLEASE...!!!!



2. After some investigative reporting by the media, it was discovered that this alleged "true story" of a Holocaust survivor was anything but. The facts? Binjamin Wilkomirski is actually Swiss-born Bruno Grosjean Doessekker, and his experience was about as real as that of the supposed "fellow survivor" who corroborated his story, Laura Grabowski.
   
   How did Grabowski play an indirect role in unmasking the author? She claimed to be an orphan who suffered torture at the hands of Nazi war criminal Josef Mengele and was later adopted by an American couple, only to have these stories be exposed as equally untrue (her childhood photos show a happy, healthy American girl w/not even hints of the emaciated sate commonly associated w/those who spent time in concentration camps). Additionally, she was revealed to actually be Lauren Stratford, author of the equally fictitious-but-presented-as-a-true-story "Satan's Underground", which detailed her alleged involvement in Satanism and the sexual abuse she endured from the time she was a young girl (something she'd also had a history of lying about since her late teens); as it turns out, "Grabowski" was actually the surname of her maternal grandparents.
   
   Don't the Wilkomirskis and Grabowskis of this world realize that their exploitation of one of the most despicable events in history is not only self-indulgent and unbelievably selfish, but giving credibility to those misguided Holocaust-denying racist groups? Such lies will allow these scumbags to convince the lesser-informed folk out there that the attempted extermination of an entire race was also nothing but lies, which I'm sure never occured to these self-indulgent storytellers as they proceeded to betray countless REAL survivors, who have already suffered enough as it is.



3. Just follow the money trail, the political bantering and incessant self-victimization (which always seems to lead into getting paid one way or another) and you'll see why the most powerful of the jewish lobby (yeah, I'm not afraid to say it) will still ENDORSE IT after it has been proven to be a complete fabrication.
   
   And they wonder why the "extremists" have so much credibility even before people look at all the facts. I've read this book and got a great laugh out of the rediculous claims, and the writings of a man obviously an older version of someone whom would be on the Jerry Springer show today if faced with a different self-victimization issue.
   
   I was already well informed this book was a fabrication in advance, so I can't say "I'm smarter than you all whom were fooled"...heck, even Elie "Weasel" fooled me the first two times around. Looks like his credibility is crap as well. I'mglad I have relatives that were on both sides of WW2; as camp munitions auditor, fitness/activity trainer (A Sergeant's job! He was denied citizenship in US but later came from Canada in about '80), a Luftwaffe infantryman whom both stayed at the conc camps, and himself taken POW when wounded in Belgium (yes many Luft Inf exist so stop emailing me, you don't know history) and a US liberator of Buchenwald...I'm glad REALITY doesnt match the whining stories of crybaby rich jews exiled after the war...so many millions of survivors all rubber-stamping eachothers stories about human soap and lampshades, all proven false by MAINSTREAM science. Like I said, follow the money trail...



4. When I read this book several years ago, I did not understand how anyone could have believed it. Having known several true Holocaust survivors, and heard their stories, I certainly didn't.
   
   Now, there have now been several clear and thorough exposes of the fraud perpetrated by Bruno Grosjean Dossekker, who falsely claimed here to be one Binjamin Wilkomirski, a child survivor of the Holocaust. Stefan Maechler, The New Yorker, 60 Minutes and several other publications prove beyond any doubt that Wilkomirski is no such person and that Fragments is a fiction.
   
   Every possible lead has now been followed; each detail in Dossekker's narration of "events" has been compared with historical records from such leading Holocaust scholars as Raul Hilberg and Lawrence Langer, accounts of other child survivors, interviews with members of the Dossekker and Grosjean families and more.
   
   The strongest evidence, unearthed by Stephan Maechler, is the fact that in 1981, Dossekker/Wilkomirski contested the will of Yvonne Grosjean, whom, in a letter to officials in Bern Switzerland, he called "my birth mother." Dossekker/Wilkomirski received a third of her estate.
   
   Other evidence includes Dossekker/Wilkomirski's use of Laura Grabowski to "corroborate" his story. Grabowski claims to have known him in a children's home in Krakow. In fact, Grabowski is an American citizen of Christian faith who has since her youth fabricated stories about her victimhood, the most well-publicized being a book called Satan's Underground.
   
   The Social Security number of said Lauren Stratford is the same as that of Grabowski, who subsequently used it to make a false survivor's claim. Furthermore, Satan's Underground and this volume contain startling similarities.
   
   --Alyssa A. Lappen



5. It is in Fragments now, a total hoax.

   A Holocaust survivor memoir that has received prestigious literary awards and lavish praise has been exposed as a hoax.

   In Fragments: Memories of a Wartime Childhood, Binjamin Wilkomirski describes his ordeal as an infant in the Jewish ghetto of Riga (Latvia), where his earliest memory is of seeing his father being killed. Wilkomirski also tells how he survived the terrible rigors of wartime internment, at the age of three or four, in the German-run concentration camps of Majdanek and Auschwitz.

   First published in German in 1995, Fragments has been translated into twelve languages. In Switzerland, the country where Wilkomirski lives, the book has been a major best-seller. Two documentary films and numerous personal appearances by the author in schools throughout the country have helped promote the memoir.

   The American edition was published by Schocken, an imprint of Random House, which heavily promoted the book with teachers' study guides and other supplementary materials.

   Jewish groups and major American newspapers have warmly praised Fragments. The New York Times called it "stunning," and the Los Angeles Times lauded it as a "classic first-hand account of the Holocaust." It received the 1996 National Jewish Book Award for Autobiography and Memoir, while in Britain it was awarded the Jewish Quarterly Literary Prize, and in France the Prix Memoire de la Shoah.

   The US Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, DC -- a federal government agency -- was so impressed that it sent Wilkomirski on a six-city United States fund-raising tour last fall.

   This past summer, though, compelling evidence came to light exposing Wilkomirski's memoir as an literary hoax.

   Although he claims to have been born in Latvia in 1939, and to have arrived in Switzerland in 1947 or 1948, Swiss legal records show that he was actually born in Switzerland in February 1941, the son of an unwed woman, Yvette Grosjean. The infant was then adopted and raised by the Doessekkers, a middle-class Zurich couple. Jewish author Daniel Ganzfried, writing in the Swiss weekly Weltwoche, also reports that he has found a 1946 photo of the young Bruno Doessekker (Wilkomirski) in the garden of his adoptive parents.

   Comparisons have been drawn between Wilkomirski's Fragments and The Painted Bird, the supposedly autobiographical "Holocaust memoir" by prominent literary figure Jerzy Kosinksi that turned out to be fraudulent.

   Reaction by Jewish Holocaust scholars to the new revelations has been instructive, because they seem more concerned about propagandistic impact than about historical truth. Their primary regret seems merely to be that the fraud has been detected, not that it was perpetrated.

   In an essay published in a major Canadian newspaper (Ottawa Citizen, Nov. 18, 1998), Jewish writer Judith Shulevitz arrogantly argued that it doesn't really matter much if Fragments is authentic. Her main misgiving, apparently, is that the deceit was not more adroit: "I can't help wishing Wilkomirksi-Doesseker [sic] had been more subtle in his efforts at deception, and produced the magnificent fraud world literature deserves."

   Deborah Dwork, director of the Center for Holocaust Studies at Clark University (Worcester, Mass.), and co-author of Auschwitz: 1270 to the Present (Yale Univ. Press, 1996), agrees that Fragments now appears to be fraudulent. At the same time, though, she expressed sympathy for Wilkomirski, saying that when she met him he appeared "to be a deeply scarred man." Amazingly, Dwork does not blame him for the imposture, "because she believes in his identity." Instead, she takes the publishers to task for having "exploited" Wilkomirski. (New York Times, Nov. 3, 1998).

   Deborah Lipstadt, author of the anti-revisionist polemic Denying the Holocaust, has assigned Fragments in her Emory University class on Holocaust memoirs. When confronted with evidence that it is a fraud, she commented that the new revelations "might complicate matters somewhat, but [the work] is still powerful."

   Daniel Ganzfried reports that Jews have complained to him that even if Fragments is a fraud, his exposé is dangerously aiding "those who deny the Holocaust."

   American Jewish writer Howard Weiss makes a similar point in an essay published in the Chicago Jewish Star (Oct. 9-29, 1998):

   Presenting a fictional account of the Holocaust as factual only provides ammunition to those who already deny that the horrors of Nazism and the death camps ever even happened. If one account is untrue, the deniers' reasoning goes, how can we be sure any survivors accounts are true ... Perhaps no one was ready to question the authenticity of the [Wilkomirski] account because just about anything concerning the Holocaust becomes sacrosanct.

   Wilkomirski himself has responded to the new revelations by going into hiding, although he did issue a defiant statement describing the climate of discussion about his memoir as a "poisonous" atmosphere of "totalitarian judgment and criticism."

1 comments about Eva's Journey: A Young Girl's True Story.

1. Eva Bromberg has the misfortune of coming into adolescence just as the Nazis invade her homeland. Eva and her father move about Poland, seeking safe haven. After soldiers take her dad and the other Jewish men in town, Eva realizes that he is dead and that she must flee.

   From 1941 to 1945, the blonde girl passes as a Christian, dodging repeated brushes with discovery and death. Ultimately the war ends, and Eva finds freedom with her mother and brother in Palestine.

   As an adult, Eva immigrated to the United States, married, and raised a family. Now a grandmother named Hava Ben-Zvi, she has finally published her thrilling story.

   Ben-Zvi, a librarian, tailors her novella-length narrative to young teens, students who are near the age she was when she began her "journey". She includes a simple timeline of the World War II and a bibliography of books about children who endured the Holocaust and other atrocities such as American slavery and Hiroshima.

   Eva's Journey is not just a lesson in history; it is a terrific read that belongs in every public and school library. For Hava Ben-Zvi is more than an educator and wonderful writer. She is Eva Bromberg--the girl who lived.

5 comments about The Last Album: Eyes from the Ashes of Auschwitz-birkenau.

1. The updated, expanded edition of The Last Album: Eyes From The Ashes Of Auschwitz- Birkenau is out, and no less hard-hitting than the original. These black and white photos were not supposed to reach the world: the Nazi order to destroy all personal photos brought to each concentration camp was meant to destroy memories as much as evidence. Despite this mandate, author Weiss uncovered an archive of over 2,400 photos brought to Auschwitz by Jewish deportees across Europe - photos hidden and saved, at great risk to their owners. These photos accompany a traveling exhibition which is making its way around the world, presenting over 400 of these photos and how the deportees arrived at Auschwitz - and how Weiss came to discover them and to research their roots. A 'must' for any serious Jewish history collection - and many a general interest holding, as well.



2. I read this book by chance, yesterday, Memorial Day 2003.
   Been crying.
   It's like Schindler's List or Sophie's choice.
   How could they do it?
   How can we let them continue doing it?
   The animals still are around us, although using another names, another symbols, another motivations.
   I kept reading, hoping to find some of the people to be safe at the end, but almost everybody was killed.
   Binim, Rozak, Mayer, Bronka, so many of you.
   I miss you, my friends.



3. After reading this book, I feel this should be in every house in every country. You hear so much about the people and the numbers killed that sometimes it doesn't seem real but this book makes it very real. The pictures are so powerful and at the same time so ordinary - they could be pictures of anyone's parents or grandparents. The most haunting pictures are those of the children - you have to wonder how many survived. The stories of the survivors bring it all home - "There's the aunt of the little girl I used to babysit", etc. I found it amazing that these pictures did survive 40, 50 years before being discovered again. Anyone who denies the Holocaust happened should read this book and then try to still say it never happened. Thank you Ann Weiss for bringing these pictures and the stores behind them out of the darkness.



4. "The last Album" by Ann Weiss is well organized and well written. It contains 400 remarkable
   photographs that were brought to Auschwitz-Birkenau by victims in 1943. These photographs were taken
   prior to the Holocaust and depict people bursting with life. This is an extremely unique book, and contains material that was lovingly researched for a period of 15 years. The beauty of this book is that the
   photographs and the research accomplished brings to life people that were lost during the dreadful time of
   the Holocaust. The book like the author is soft, sweet, articulate and brilliant



5. This book is an amazing piece of history. The fact that so many photos brought into Auschwitz have survived is phenomenol as all personal effects were automotically burned by the Nazis murderers. When viewing the photos in this book, which were brought in by those of the Sosnowiec-Bendzin transport, it would also be advisable to read Tadeusz Borokowski's book "This way to the gas ladies & gentleman' as this book covers the particular Sosnowiec-Bendzin transport and outlines in gruesome and terrifying detail what became of many of those on this transport. The photographs bring back to life many who are gone and also tells you those who survived, which is a relief to realise that some of those from the Polish ghettos made it. These photos bring back a lost world that will never return and along with Roman Vishniac's collection of photographs are a piece of history that is very much worth investing in.

5 comments about Broken Alliance: The Turbulent Times Between Blacks and Jews in America.

1. Kaufman's basic assumption is that the alliance between African-Americans and Jews was never as smooth as history makes it out to be. By exhaustively researching that alliance and presenting it through the points of view of six prominent leaders of the Civil Rights movement, Kaufman provides a unique overview of the racial issues of the previous century, but it is not without flaws. First, like many liberals, Kaufman is too broad-minded to take his own side in an argument. Thus, he goes into great detail in explaining away Black antisemitism, but never seems to realize that there is no Jewish equivalent. Black outrage over the lack of Jewish support for affirmative action is constantly brought up throughout the book, but the use of quotas to restrict Jewish admissions to Ivy League schools is mentioned only twice, creating the impression that Jews were opposed to affirmative action out of a desire to avoid competition, rather than out of fear of being shut out (again) of the professions. He routinely glosses over the records of many of the militant Black leaders who took over after Dr. King's assassination, making them seem simply outspoken or radical, rather than thuggish or criminal, as in the case of the Black Panthers, for example. Anti-semitic acts are routinely explained away as having been taken out of context (his history of the Oceanhill-Brownsville controversy provides a context for the reading of a virulently anti-semitic poem on WBAI that all-but excuses it). His coverage of the Crown Heights riots (in the updated version of the book) avoids mentioning critical facts about the murder of Yankel Rosenbaum and subsequent acquittal of Lemrick Nelson which cast the Black community in a poor light (the jury actually partied with Nelson after the acquittal). The final chapter of the book is a discussion of the importance of the alliance, but it is written on the presumption that political conservatives dislike both Blacks and Jews and are relishing the fight, which is stated explicitly, and which diminishes the value of the book as a historical record. In the end, it's simply an attempt to get Jews to keep giving money to Democrats and Blacks to continue to vote for them so that they can defeat those evil conservatives. Given the rise of anti-semitism since 9/11, the history in this book is even more critical to understanding the schisms in American culture, but Kaufman's bias reduces its value, taking what could have been the definitive history of a critical alliance in the Civil Right movement and reducing it to a partisan appeal.



2. This book takes a good look at some social problems in America. It was written in 1988, but I have the updated edition from 1995.
   
   Blacks and Jews are minorities that cooperated during the civil rights struggles of the early 1960s. And there is still some cooperation on that issue, as various states continue to discriminate against minority voters.
   
   We see some of the cooperation and also some of the problems as this book as the experiences of six different people are examined in detail.
   
   Paul Parks, a Black who joined the civil rights movement in the 1960s, in chosen as an example of one who valued a Black-Jewish alliance. In April 1945, he was one of the soldiers who liberated the concentration camp at Dachau. But in 1967, he noted that there were complaints by some Blacks about Jewish landlords in the ghettos. Parks wanted to distinguish between the slumlords and those Whites who were actively helping the Blacks, given that without White support, Black causes would be hurt. But we see how many of the more politically involved Blacks thought of the Jews not as another minority but as part of the White majority.
   
   Next, we see Jack Greenberg and Esther Brown, who filed a landmark suit against segregated schools (Brown versus the Board of Education). These were Jews who saw the issue "not as a Negro cause but as a human cause." Still, there were problems when some Blacks decided to boycott a class that Greenberg taught at Harvard on "Race and the Law" to protest the fact that the instructor was not Black.
   
   After that, there is the story of Rhody McCoy, a Black who became the head of the Ocean Hills-Brownsville school district in New York City. Right away, there was a problem with a teacher strike. McCoy kept the schools open by hiring sustitute teachers, but this soured relations with the strikers. The issue became bigger, bitter, and painful, and certainly reduced cooperation among Blacks and Jews in the city.
   
   The story Kaufman tells next is of Roz Ebstein and her family. Hers was just one of many Jewish families in Chicago that supported the civil rights movement in the 1960s. But we discover the effects of blockbusting, as her neighborhood, rather than becoming integrated, simply became almost exclusively Black. Eventually, she and her family felt forced to move to a new neighborhood, a few miles away, in order to be in a better school district and to avoid harrassment from Blacks.
   
   There is an excellent section about Martin Peretz, who became the editor of The New Republic in 1974. Right away, we see one effect of Black-Jewish cooperation, namely that some Jews who learned more about Black culture and history decided they might as well learn about Jewish culture and history as well. Peretz, a liberal, couldn't stand Begin, a conservative Israeli Prime Minister. But Peretz made a point of supporting Israel's right to exist in the New Republic. Peretz, a stong supporter of civil rights, raised hundreds of thousands of dollars for the civil rights movement. But a turning point came in 1967, with the National Convention on New Politics. This group became dominated by radicals who tended to ignore problems of poverty, oppression, the war in Vietnam, racism, and discrimination and instead attacked Zionism. Peretz was more cautious about which groups he supported after that.
   
   The final chapter is about Donna Brazile, a well-known political campaign chairwoman. We see her introduction to issues that were separating Blacks and Jews: Jewish landlords, failure of some Jews to support affirmative action, and failure of some Blacks to support Israel. Plus, some specific problems, such as the firing of Andrew Young as UN ambassador and Black Presidential candidate Jesse Jackson meeting with terrorist leader Yasser Arafat. Through all this, Brazile kept her focus on trying to get as diverse and inclusive group of supporters as possible in her campaigns.
   
   I was struck by the mention of Alice Walker, who wrote "The Color Purple." Walker is well-known as a sensitive and thoughtful person. The book tells that when asked about Farrakhan, she condemned him as a bigot and an antisemite. But the book also tells of Walker's attitude about Israel, and this shocked me. I'm not asking that she favor some minority, whether it be Blacks, Jews, Pagans, or anyone else. But I am asking someone with her credentials to support human rights against aggressive and lying tyrants, thugs, and bullies. I feel that Walker should have found some way to oppose antizionism very strongly, and I certainly condemn her for not doing so.
   
   I think the issue of cooperation among minorities is important. There is a tendency for minorities, often in an effort to win favor with the majority, to show hostility to other minorities. That is not the true path.
   
   I recommend this book.



3. I highly recommend this book - particularly the section on "the last Jewish liberals" who tried to make integration, civil rights work for their family in a changing South Side Chicago neighborhood.

   It didn't work, they eventually fled the lowrer class, Black takeover and moved to the suburbs, only they stayed longer than the other Whites.

   The book works well because the author writes very personal stories that present the truth about what happened.




4. Both Jews and blacks have suffered greatly in various parts of the world. In the United States, there has been somewhat of alliance between the two groups. Brokedn Alliances deals with this alliance, like the NAACP having many Jewish lawyers and how Jews and Blacks came toghether for the civil rights movement. It also deals with how these groups have been losing contact due many factors like black anti-semitism and the importance of Israel to American Jews.

   Broken alliances is definetely something people should read if they want a better understanding of the history of race relations.




5. The Jews and African Americans share a history of suffering and bigotry unequaled in recent times. History suggests that they should be the closest of partners in dealing with these issues. However to read the news you would think that they were historical enemies. This has not always been true. The Alliance between Jews and African Americans was a powerful force for change over most of this century. Jonathan tells the story of that Alliance and how it fell apart.

   As a journalist Jonathan tells this unique story from the perspective of important individuals on both sides. He traces them and their changing perspectives through these significant historical changes. It is this personal perspective that makes Jonathan's stories so compelling.

No comments about The Journey Back from Hell: An Oral History : Conversations With Concentration Camp Survivors.

No comments about Marc Klionsky.

1 comments about A Friend Called Anne.

1. Her name shall never be forgotten, for she told a story through her diary with such delicate words. She perished before she could live the fame she always dreamed of, changing the world without knowing she did so. Anne Frank has been known internationally because of her desire to keep a record of everything that happened to her during the time she lived. In A Friend Called Anne, Jacqueline Van Maarsen tells of her friendship with Anne ever since they met in Nazi-invaded Amsterdam. They watched together as their lives were slowly changing in ways that they didn't like but were powerless to prevent. When they met for the first time, they quickly became inseparable. This was until the day Anne and her family went into hiding to escape deportation to the Nazi concentration camps. Jacqueline describes the feeling of narrowly escaping deportation during the Holocaust and the tragedy of Anne's so sudden death. Although the book was presented well, the characters were lifeless which made this memoir tedious and unexciting.
   
   A Friend Called Anne has a plot that is neither appealing nor exciting. I found the book itself slow and difficult to understand. I was amazed at the fact that the novel was a true story but disappointed in the writing itself. The author didn't give a great amount of details, therefore making the background information unclear and confusing. I am aware that the Holocaust was an extremely devastating time period and Jacqueline Van Maarson does not express such a feeling of tragedy in great detail. Without the specific details and descriptions of personalities, feelings and settings, the biography was lacking in many ways. Although it was quite a good example of the true meaning of friendship and a special one at that, I would have liked to hear more about the Anne and Jacqueline's childhood friendship before the Nazi's took over. If the author had really gone into to depth about the troubles and whereabouts of Anne's family, the storyline could possibly be strengthened. Towards the end, Jacqueline learned that Anne had been in hiding with the rest of her family for quite some time. I would have liked it much better if the author switched back and forth between Jacqueline's tale and Anne's tale at that point. Instead, she focused mainly on Jacqueline whose tale was quite flat and uneventful. In the final portion of the book, I wanted to hear about Anne and her sister Margot captured in the Bergen-Belsen camp, where they were sent from Auschwitz. However, I enjoyed hearing Jacqueline's feelings after hearing of Anne's death. As she revisited Anne's hiding spot when times were worst, she spotted picture of her and Anne as young children and told Mr. Frank, "Looking at the pictures on the fading wallpaper of Anne's room in the secret annex was like looking at ghosts." But overall, I was disappointed in the book because I know how exciting Anne Frank's experience was and it did not portray appealing and exciting stories I was hoping for.
   
   I found the biography dull and depressing purely because the emotionless characters and lack of details. The author poorly presents the relationships between people and places. Nothing about the book amused me in any way, and in my opinion, that is my definition of a boring story.

5 comments about Nesarim: Child Survivors of Terezin (The Library of Holocaust Testimonies).

1. This book which tells the stories of ten survivors of Terezin, a "showcase" Nazi concentration camp established to host visits by the International Red Cross, lends a unique perspective to the Holocaust literature.
   
   Twenty-year old Franta supervised young boys, aged 12 to 14, in Room 7 and the lessons he taught them under the most adverse circumstances were incredible. They were educated in secret by him and other prisoners about their Jewish religion, history, culture and secular subjects. Education has always been of prime importance to Jews, but the fact that they were able to instill children with so much information under the most adverse circumstances was a miracle.
   
   As you continue reading you have to feel that Franta was a gift from God to help the children get through this horrendous ordeal, despite the suffering and inhumanity happening all around them. Somehow he provided them with a stability that allowed them to eventually marry, raise families and lead productive lives. How wise, far beyond his years, he had to be.
   
   Despite the unspeakable horrors the young boys witnessed, their perseverance, resilience, humanity and friendship won out. This should be required reading for all Confirmation classes.



2. An extraordinary book in whih a twenty-year old, named Franta, during the most terrifying of times, inspires forty ten and twelve years olds who were torn from their families, with a faith in their own humanity, with a will to live, and "a respect for our parents and the past, and to be ready for life when this [the Holocaust] ends." The stories of ten of the survivors and how they managed to survive extends to after the war and emphasizes the bonds that continue to exist in adulthood between them. "Nesarim" is an inspiration for young and old.
   Sam D. Starobin



3. This is the war-time story of the boys in Room 7 at the infamous Nazi concentration camp, Terezin, in Czechoslovakia. Thelma Gruenbaum's book, "Nesarim," is a heart-stopping tale of courage and survival.
   Almost 50 years after the boys walked out of Terezin, Gruenbaum embarked on her mission to find the survivors. Her determination to tell their story was inspired by her husband,Michael, one of the boys in Room 7.
   Travelling the world, the Gruenbaums interviewed ten who survived with Michael [Misa]. Many of the boys had never spoken of their experiences at Terezin but in 1990, as men of 60, and encouraged by Thelma Gruenbaum, they opened their souls to share those tales.
   The meaning of the word "Nesarim" is Eagles, a name the boys of Room 7 gave themselves. Their stories give truth and meaning to the name as we witness their indomitable spirit.
   An inspiring story that reminds us that courage and humanity can be stronger than the forces of destruction. Thelma Gruenbaum has told an important story and done so beautifully.



4. I was Born in Prague 1933. My family knew the Gruenbaum family well. I was fortunate to leave the country in 1941. After reading NESARIM I now know exactly and vividly what my fate might have been; would have been!
   The book is well written and the descriptions of people places and events come to life along with their innermost feelings.



5. This book touched my heart with amazing stories of courage, life long bonds of friendship, and the triumph of the human spirit in the face of unspeakable horrors. It's a must read!