Please recommend Holocaust books - 1st person accounts only

amother

Mocha

Fri, Apr 29 2022, 12:52 am

I recently read ‘the nazis knew my name’
About a girl who was on one of the first transports to auschwitz. It was a different perspective to a lot of the books I’ve read.
‘The happiest man on earth’ is also good

MommyPhD

Fri, Apr 29 2022, 1:18 am

perquacky wrote:

Has anyone mentioned NIGHT by Elie Weisel? Often required reading in schools and one of the earlier first person accounts of survival during the Holocaust.

Was just about to mention this one. It's a classic for a reason. It is an understatement to say that Wiesel is a beautiful writer. I teach Night in one of my lower-level English classes every spring. Students really respond to it.

#BestBubby

Fri, Apr 29 2022, 1:26 am

I read "Night" but not for frum kids.

The author became an atheist after witnessing the atrocities.

When a child was executed by public hanging, Wiesel said "G-d is there - Dead" or something like that.

MommyPhD

Fri, Apr 29 2022, 1:49 am

#BestBubby wrote:

I understand your perspective, but I'd like to counter with the fact that Wiesel grappled with something we will hopefully never experience. I don't think it's fair to judge him for that or to censor his work. Moreover, I recently read an interview with his son Elisha (on Chabad's website) that discusses Elie's love of Judaism. So I definitely don't think it's fair to call him an atheist.

Q: Why do you think people ask you these questions? (if Wiesel believes in Hashem)

A: It is for their sake. They want to understand. Look, a very religious person would not ask me this question; only if that religious person has some anxiety or some doubt, then that person wants to know how I deal with that anxiety and that doubt. And I say, `Look, I have faith. It’s a wounded faith.’

GLUE

Fri, Apr 29 2022, 2:01 am

If you read everything that is listed hear and run out of stuff to read:

The golden thread-Kassia St. Clair

Is a book on how different types of fabric are made, there is a chapter that is on a women who worked as a slave in one of the natzi's fabric factory's. It is one chapter not a whole book.

Reality

Fri, Apr 29 2022, 2:04 am

Sunnydays wrote:

They have a few of the full versions of the holocaust diaries on https://www.amazingjewishbooks.com

Thank you! Also thank you to the anonymous amother who also suggested this site.

Corrected for typo.

Last edited by Reality on Fri, Apr 29 2022, 2:07 am; edited 1 time in total

Reality

Fri, Apr 29 2022, 2:07 am

Another very different story is The Nazi Officer's Wife.

I'm not sure if the OP only wants books about frum people. This book is about a Jewish woman who married a nazi to survive.

happytobemom

Fri, Apr 29 2022, 2:09 am

Reality wrote:

I've read almost all the abridged versions of the holocaust diaries published by CIS. I wish I could find the full versions. They Called Me Frau Anna and Alone in the Forest are standout books in the series.

If you're in Lakewood, Capitol Sefarim is a used book store on Rt. 9 (Howell), they often have the Holocaust Diaries.

amother

Sunflower

Fri, Apr 29 2022, 6:25 am

A frum journalist I know interviewed Elie Weisel around 20 years ago. She asked him point blank if he put on tefilin, and he said yes, he put them on everyday.
Also, in his other memoirs about life after the war, he said he stopped being religious for a time, but came back to it. He was shomer shabbos.
Interesting connection to another name mentioned here, Livia Bitton Jackson. Elie's sister died young (of illness). Her husband remarried Livia, and they raised their blended family of children together.
Livia is still living. There are interviews of her on YouTube, pretty recent ones. I watched on the past Tisha b'av, it was recorded during covid.

metacognizant

Fri, Apr 29 2022, 7:59 am

Reality wrote:

Another very different story is The Nazi Officer's Wife.

I'm not sure if the OP only wants books about frum people. This book is about a Jewish woman who married a nazi to survive.

It doesn't matter to me who wrote the book - Frum, not frum, not Jewish. Heck it could be a book by a perpetrator. The thing that I'm looking for is *1st person perspectives* of people who were there.

metacognizant

Fri, Apr 29 2022, 8:06 am

Many people have recommended various titles in the Holocaust Diaries series but also mentioned that they were published in various editions, some abridged and sanitized. I'm pushing 40 and part of my rationale for this whole project is that I am as ready as I'll ever be for the "whole truth." Same for questions of emunah etc. Obviously if someone goes through the Holocaust their world view will change. My grandfather survived by adopting a Polish identity. After the Holocaust he lived as a Jew again BUT was EXTREMELY opposed to "looking" Jewish. He never wore a kippa in public for example. It drove him bonkers that my brothers had long payes. I remember him fighting with my mother about this. To him that would be like putting a fork in a power outlet, just obviously dangerous. He can't be judged for this. I don't think any survivor can be judged, and we benefit from hearing their testimony. Anyway... does anyone know how to tell if I'm reading an "original" Holocaust Diary book or a sanitized one?

metacognizant

Fri, Apr 29 2022, 8:36 am

amother [ Hyssop ] wrote:

Man’s search for meaning - victor Frankl
The choice- Edith Egar
Treblinka
Night

Treblinka - do you have an author? Is this a 1st person account?

metacognizant

Fri, Apr 29 2022, 8:40 am

#BestBubby wrote:

Also - I am not seeking recommendations for my kids. This is *for myself.* And while I received a mainstream Orthodox 80s-90s Holocaust education, the gaps in my education are.... the first person uncensored and not necessarily hopeful or uplifting accounts.

amother

Bisque

Fri, Apr 29 2022, 8:55 am

The unknown black book. A collection of first person accounts of lone survivors of the massacres in the area of the former USSR occupied by the Germans (like Lithuania, Belarus, Ukraine, Crimea). Was a game changing perspective for me- so little is written about this huge area of Europe since there were so few who survived (1.5 million killed, Hyd) and those who did were generally trapped behind the Iron Curtain afterwards. Also these accounts were given right after the war so they are incredibly fresh.

amother

DarkKhaki

Fri, Apr 29 2022, 10:21 am

I went through a time of reading everything holocaust also in my early 40s. I wanted to understand the hushed whispers of my youth. In the end, what I found so helpful were books that detailed the history and culture leading up to the war years. It just helped me understand the background and helped me to process it all. I never realized how heavily it all weighed on me until I began exploring it as a mature adult. And yes, a lot of it is so so disturbing.

endlesslybaking

Fri, Apr 29 2022, 11:11 am

I don't know if anyone else might have said this before, because I didn't look at the whole thread, but Playing For Time by Fania Fenelon (Goldstein) was a life changer for me. (More than Night by Elie Wiesel, which is a mandatory classic)

#BestBubby

Fri, Apr 29 2022, 1:11 pm

It is scary how much USA today resembles Nazi Germany in the 1930s - BEFORE the Holocaust started.

(I am NOT comparing USA to the Holocaust but to the events BEFORE the Holocaust started).