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The Zookeeper's Wife: A War Story

3.47 of 5 stars 3.47 · rating details · 18,487 ratings · 3,561 reviews

The New York Times bestseller: a true story in which the keepers of the Warsaw zoo saved hundreds of people from Nazi hands. When Germany invaded Poland, Stuka bombers devastated Warsaw—and the city's zoo along with it. With most of their animals dead, zookeepers Jan and Antonina Zabinski began smuggling Jews into empty cages. Another dozen "guests" hid inside the Zabinski...more

Paperback, 384 pages

Published September 17th 2008 by W. W. Norton & Company (first published September 17th 2007)

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Apr 22, 2008 Kate rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Recommended to Kate by: I heard her interviewed on NPR

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here. I can't decide whether I enjoyed this book or not. I think the idea of it is more interesting than the execution. It follows the true story of Antonina Zabinski and her family, caretakers of the Warsaw zoo during the Nazi occupation of Poland. Diane Ackerman, being a literary writer and not an historical one, was able to provide an interesting spin on the subject matter, and I loved all of the imagery and description of Antonina's relationship with the animals and general life at the zoo. Howeve...more I can't decide whether I enjoyed this book or not. I think the idea of it is more interesting than the execution. It follows the true story of Antonina Zabinski and her family, caretakers of the Warsaw zoo during the Nazi occupation of Poland. Diane Ackerman, being a literary writer and not an historical one, was able to provide an interesting spin on the subject matter, and I loved all of the imagery and description of Antonina's relationship with the animals and general life at the zoo. However, this is still is a true story, and as such I felt the book didn't maintain enough focus on the story line and was lacking in many crucial historical details. Ackerman goes off on too many completely unrelated tangents, which would be interesting if the book were longer, but it seems like she overlooked important pieces of the puzzle in favor of long descriptions of marginal players in the story. She would take half a page to describe how the wind rustled the trees, and then just gloss over things like how the Germans never noticed that there were a ton of extra people living in the house, despite the fact that soldiers would pop in all the time. All of a sudden I was at the endnotes and hadn't even realized that the book ended. It's almost as if as she was nearing the end, someone walked into the room and said, "Come on Diane, finish up so we can go to dinner." There is almost no closure, just a few short and antiseptic paragraphs about what they did after the war along with a sort of epilogue of other people that were mentioned here and there in the book. Ackerman describes meeting with the son in Warsaw and touring the old house, but he seems disinterested in reminiscing about their time at the zoo, but doesn't speculate as to why. Here are some examples of hugely important issues that weren't really addressed:

- Why did Jan retire so suddenly, after all his time as a zookeeper?
- With the zoo villa playing such a large part of story, there is no mention of whether they had to move out after Jan retired
- Why is it that after growing up in a zoo and having a constant array of pets by his side during the whole story, Rys (the son) has no pets now?
- When and how did Jan & Antonina die?

I wouldn't necessarily say that this book wasn't worth reading, it just seemed like Ackerman focused on so many painstakingly small details throughout the book, and then suddenly ran out of paper or something. (less)

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Oct 20, 2009 Daniel rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: 2009

"The Zookeeper's Wife" is somewhat difficult for me to review. It's certainly not a bad book, but I found its passages dealing with the horrors of Germany's occupation of Poland during World War II interspersed with sections recounting cute animal shenanigans a bit hard to take, even though Diane Ackerman's telling a true story.

This may be less Ackerman's fault and more the fault of her source material. She depends largely, it seems, on Antonina Zabinski's diary to recount the goings on at the W...more

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Dec 29, 2007 David rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This is another book exploring the lives of people living in the countries occupied by Germany during WWII. Unlike most, this was written by a naturalist, not an historian. This gives the book an interesting take on the Nazi occupation of Warsaw.
The narrative centers around Antonia Zabinski and her husband Jan. Prior to the outbreak of war, they were the caretakers of the Warsaw Zoo - a large zoo befitting the capital of Poland. The book paints a brief picture of what their life was like prior t...more

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Aug 07, 2009 Barbara rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition Recommends it for: Maria, Teri,Kelly and all my GR friends

Shelves: holocaust-ww-2, non-fiction

There is no way that I can sit down and adequately review this book after reading it. Diane Ackerman has skillfully and beautifully written this very complex story. She is a naturalist, who has very well utilized her discipline to write this historical piece. It will remain with me for a very long time, so I must mull it over and deliberate how I can do justice to this multilayered tale. I have read many accounts of WW II, in articles and in books, but Ackerman was able to create charm, suspense...more

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Apr 22, 2008 Lexi rated it 1 of 5 stars · review of another edition Recommends it for: no one

I STRUGGLED to get through this book. I ended up skimming the last thirty pages because I couldn't wait for it to be over. The author strays too much from the story line, and although it's historical, she puts too many unnecessary facts in the book. Her overdescribing nature is cloying and terribly annoying. This had the potential to be a good book, but she didn't give much to the actual, REAL LIFE story. A sore disappointment. Don't bother.

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Nov 21, 2010 Annalisa rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: book-club, memoir-biography

All this time I thought this was a piece of fiction and was delighted to realized it's non-fiction. There's something off about telling the story as though it were fiction, sometimes slipping into novel-style storytelling and sometimes info-dumping for pages about zoology or Polish tradition or Nazi habits in what should have been footnotes. It probably reads a little easier than straight non-fiction to stylize it that, but it left me with a longing to delve more into the details of the story Ac...more All this time I thought this was a piece of fiction and was delighted to realized it's non-fiction. There's something off about telling the story as though it were fiction, sometimes slipping into novel-style storytelling and sometimes info-dumping for pages about zoology or Polish tradition or Nazi habits in what should have been footnotes. It probably reads a little easier than straight non-fiction to stylize it that, but it left me with a longing to delve more into the details of the story Ackerman couldn't know, for a more fleshed-out story.

I love, love, love that this book is about the giving Polish people who rarely make an appearance in other Holocaust stories. The Polish are fierce, defiant, and extremely patriotic and it was a major blow to them and to their intellectual and artsy capital to have the Germans so easy destroy all that culture. What I wouldn't give to step back in time and see Warsaw before September 1939 in all its glory. While the Jews were at the front of a grand extermination project, so were the Polish. The Nazis wanted their beautiful country for their own people and nothing, not the people, not their architecture, not their vegetation and animals, were good enough for Hitler's Aryan race. Not only did the Polish have Germany on one side of them fighting to claim their country, they had Russia on the other doing the same thing in a much more underhanded way. If Poland had fearfully stood by, there may be nothing left of their culture today.

But they didn't. The Polish Underground was the most organized in World War II and did some of the worst damage to Nazi cargo. The Warsaw Ghetto was the only one to fight back against its Nazi oppressors. And while other stories may tell of scared Polish people turning in Jewish neighbors, many of them leave out the thousands of Poles who hid, fed, transported, and risked their lives to help their Jewish friends and neighbors. If a German were found hiding a Jew, they would have been sent to a labor camp, but if a Pole were suspected of helping Jews, they'd be shot on the spot. Their lives were only slightly more valuable than a Jewish life, and not even more valuable, but not quite targeted yet.

And what did the Poles get for all their fighting and patriotism? Almost fifty years trapped behind the Iron Curtain where much of their story was lost. (Let's not forget that it was the Poles who set off the chain of events that brought down the Cold War.) While I didn't connect the Zabinskis and the people they saved as I would have liked (a fictionalized story to give substance to their lives and terror would have served the story better), I did with the Polish plight and I'm glad that there was enough details of the zookeeper's story to tell.

My favorite quote:
Dozens of statues and monuments grace Warsaw's streets, because Poland is a country half submerged in its heavily invaded past, fed by progress, but always partly mourning.(less)

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Apr 22, 2008 Jen Meegan rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Let me preface by saying a) I love Diane Ackerman's previous works and b) I have a deep interest in holocaust history. Therefore, I was surprised her latest book did not engage me as much as I'd hoped.

Ackerman usually tackles very broad, amorphous subjects like love, the five senses, etc. And her somewhat circular and poetic writing style is, I think, well suited to those topics. But for The Zookeepers Wife, I craved a level of linear details and specifics that I just could not find. I quickly...more

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Apr 22, 2008 Jenny rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

When I was in sixth grade I fashioned a yellow star out of felt, wrote "Jude" on it and sewed it onto a black peacoat. I have always been interested in the Holocaust and am quite well read on the subject. I have NEVER thought about the animals that were involved or the people who took care of the animals, such as zookeepers. It never even crossed my mind and I thank this book for bringing this important part of the war to my attention. I didn't care that the book was particularly well written an...more

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Dec 21, 2008 Toni rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: biography-memoir, holocaust, history, war-stories, multi-cultural, poland

What a disappointment! I anxiously awaited the paperback version of this book, only to find the writing so scattered and choppy I could barely finish it. The author obviously did extensive and exhaustive research, but she kept going off on so many random tangents that finding a cohesive story is impossible.

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Dec 20, 2008 Grady rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

'Why do we humanize animals and animalize humans?'

There are many stories that continue to come out of the WW II experience, stories of courage, love and survival in the face of near hopeless situations inflicted upon the globe by Nazi Germany, and, thankfully, biographies of heroes whose moral convictions were stronger than the destructive forces of Hitler's cadre. THE ZOOKEEPER'S WIFE is yet another unknown story, a true tale of survival of the human spirit pitted against what seemed to be the...more 'Why do we humanize animals and animalize humans?'

There are many stories that continue to come out of the WW II experience, stories of courage, love and survival in the face of near hopeless situations inflicted upon the globe by Nazi Germany, and, thankfully, biographies of heroes whose moral convictions were stronger than the destructive forces of Hitler's cadre. THE ZOOKEEPER'S WIFE is yet another unknown story, a true tale of survival of the human spirit pitted against what seemed to be the end of the world in Poland. Yet this book is not 'just another war story'. As presented by the astute investigator and gifted writer Diane Ackerman, whose many books include 'A Natural History of the Senses', 'An Alchemy of Mind: The Marvel and Mystery of the Brain', 'The Moon by Whale Light - and Other Adventures Among Bats, Penguins', Crocodilians and Whales', 'A Natural History of Love', 'Deep Play', 'Cultivating Delight: A Natural History of My Garden', 'The Rarest of the Rare: Vanishing Animals, Timeless Worlds', and anthologies of poems such as 'I Praise My Destroyer: Poems' and 'Jaguar of Sweet Laughter: New and Selected Poems', this is a magical tale about a couple in Warsaw whose roles as zookeepers allowed their shared appreciation for animal life and ways of adapting to devise ingenious ways to protect many of the Jews from the Warsaw Ghetto from mass execution.

Jan and Antonina Zabinski were Polish Christian keepers of the Zoo when the Germans under Hitler's scheme of world domination and purification of Europe for the chosen race of Aryans began. Ackerman quietly builds her setting by concentrating on the special gifts of these two remarkable people in caring for the animals of the zoo: her descriptions of the various members of the menagerie are at once comical and insightful. When Hitler's move into Poland began the Zabinskis, long friends with the many Jews who lived around them, devised clever ways to turn the zoo and their own villa into a safe haven for the increasingly threatened annihilation of their friends who happened to be Jewish. Throughout the horrors of the German destruction of the city and the attempts of the Warsaw Uprising, led in part by Jan Zabinski, the couple maintained an atmosphere of calm and grace for the some 300 Jews in their hiding. Using the Zoo as a shield to deflect occupying German interest in animal studies as a part of their theory of purification, and as a means to gather food in the Jewish Ghetto for the 'animals', they were able to feed their 'guests' and provide papers and documents to aid the escape of the Jews who chose to flee Poland. And after the war the Zabinskis continued to refurbish the zoo and offer sanctity to those Jews whose lives had been so devastated during the crush of Warsaw.

Ackerman is a master craftsman and her depth of scientific knowledge about the animal kingdom makes her ability to relate this story of 'The Zookeeper's Wife' match the inordinate amount of research about her subjects to create an important document about an historical fact previously unknown. And yet her ability to invest her story with poetic force is always evident: '...war plays havoc with sensory memories as the sheer intensity of each moment, the roiling adrenaline and fast pulse, drive memories in deeper, embed every small detail, and make events unforgettable. While that can strengthen friendship or love, it can also taint sensory treasures like music. By associating any tune with danger, one never again hears it without adrenaline pounding as memory hits consciousness followed by a jolt of fear...It's a terrific way to ruin great music'.

There are times in this fine novel when the reader is jarred from the flow of the story being told by Ackerman's insertions of data or stepping in to remind us that she interviewed some of the survivors in her research: the drama of the tale is diluted momentarily by facts and figures and names, moving the reader away from the visceral experience of the Zabinski's story to remind us that we are reading a documented biography. Yet in the end the book is so powerful, so overflowing with gracious writing and so full of the indomitable human spirit that such small 'flaws' become inconsequential. Ackerman has unveiled another great moment in the histories of human kindness during times of war, and we are the richer for it. Highly recommended.
Grady Harp

(less)

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Jul 27, 2009 Chris rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: history-ww-ii, history-poland

The Zookeeper's Wife is a micro chasm book. This means that it deals with a small event and only that small event. It does help when reading this book if you have a good, working knowledge of Europe in WWII, in particular the Warsaw Uprising. Ackerman's greatest flaw in the book is that there is not much background detail. She keeps the focus on the zoo; in fact, she seems more in love with the zoo than with the Zabinskis and their "guests".

This said, it still is a very enjoyable book. It is qui...more

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Nov 30, 2008 taryn rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: absolutefavs

This WWII account about a family of zookeepers who shelter Jews from the Nazis in Warsaw, Poland is a surprisingly uplifting description of life during the bloodiest years of the war.

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Dec 10, 2008 Glenna rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

What happens to your zoo after it is bombed in the war? Use it in the underground railroad to help save the lives of Jews. This is a true story of courage and ingenuity. This book spends most of the time talking about what happened before, during and after the war at the zoo. It does not really dwell on the atrocities going on around them. That makes it a nice read because you do know what is happening around them, but you don't have to read about stacks of bodies.

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Jan 08, 2009 Kathy rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I was disappointed in this book. A great (and true) story of kindness, courage, and hope in the most horrific of times, The Zookeeper's Wife is the story of the family that ran the Warsaw Zoo during the time of the German occupation of Poland. After all the animals were killed or transplanted to other zoos, Antonina, her husband Jan, and son Rys, helped aid and shelter Jews who would certainly have been killed in concentration camps without their assistance. While the story is great, the problem...more

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Mar 26, 2009 Nic rated it 1 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I read this history because it was this year's One Book One San Diego, choice. I believe it got the vote because it is nonfiction and the other nominees (the outstanding Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close and Dave Eggers' What is the What) are fiction and there is a clear belief that people should not waste their time reading things that aren't true. Anyone who knows me, knows that I don't subscribe to that bias. Fiction is the lie that tells the truth and I shed tears over Jonathan Froer's 9-1...more

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Apr 04, 2012 alysa rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

What a wonderful story. I picked up this book not realizing that it was a true story or that it was about WWII. Ackerman has such an incredibly descriptive style that the reader truly feels as if they are there. I will have to look for more books by her. I loved the way she described every detail with all the senses. That asside this was such an emotional story about a Polish family living through the German occupation and helping to save the lives of Jews living within the Warsaw Getto. As it i...more

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Mar 02, 2013 Ayelet Waldman rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

If you believe this novel, the vast majority of Poles were busy saving Jews. Well, since 90% (YES! THAT MANY) of Polish Jews were exterminated, and since the very few who survived tell us that the vast majority of Poles not only did nothing but applauded the death of the Jews among them, it's hard not to feel like much of this novel is horse-shit. I understand the impulse to glorify the few righteous Gentiles, but the whole point is that there were VERY few of them. That's why they were so amazi...more

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Dec 14, 2008 Mara rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: history, non-fiction, wwii

This book isn't really about the zookeeper's wife. Rather, Ackerman uses the story of Antonina Zabinski as a backdrop to tell the larger story of the Nazi occupation of Warsaw and the Polish Resistance. As a story-telling technique, I have no problem with this, and Ackerman does it fairly well. We learn a lot about Warsaw during the war, as well as learning about such things as the zookeeping trade and animal life. The biggest drawback to Ackerman's use of the technique, I think, is that she sta...more

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Mar 10, 2011 Wanda rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

In a sentence: Someone else should have written the Zabinski's story. This mess, full of purple prose adds very little to the narrative of Polish heroism in World War II. Nor does it add much about the Jewish Holocaust and I simply do not know how Ackerman got the rights to the story, when so many other, better writers could have done justice to it.
Based on the great reviews from some rather credible sources, I couldn't wait to read this book. Wow, was I disappointed. First, there were factual e...more In a sentence: Someone else should have written the Zabinski's story. This mess, full of purple prose adds very little to the narrative of Polish heroism in World War II. Nor does it add much about the Jewish Holocaust and I simply do not know how Ackerman got the rights to the story, when so many other, better writers could have done justice to it.
Based on the great reviews from some rather credible sources, I couldn't wait to read this book. Wow, was I disappointed. First, there were factual errors throughout, which, given the archives that are available and translators/linguists to whom she could have turned, were inexcusable. Several had to do with the Cichociemni – clandestine special forces of which my dad was one. The correct number of these was 344 transported to Poland from the U.K. -- a number she got wrong - 365. Also, 18 were lost in the Uprising – not 11. Even a simple google search will give you the numbers. She also got the phonetic pronunciation wrong – it is cheeho-chiemnee, not cheeko – ch in Polish is pronounced as a simple H. Any Pole who speaks the language could have told her this.
There are other factual WW II things that are in error as well that others have mentioned in their reviews, so I won't belabor the issue, besides I think that this book is less about the context of WW II and more about Ackerman's self-indulgent poetic license.
OK, so Polish experience of WW II is my issue, and perhaps I am nit picking, but I am not making boatloads of money off this book – and when I write my own books, my editors and I make darn sure that the facts are correct.
The story of Jan and Antonina Zabinski, set during the German occupation of Poland, is a truly amazing one, in which these two courageous Warsawian zookeepers demonstrated courage, brilliance, resilience, and humanity in the face of the grossest barbarism this planet has seen. It is a story that is inspirational to say the least. Having said that, Ackerman did not tell it well, despite her laudable attempt to bring these unsung heroes the praise and attention they well deserved. Also praiseworthy was her unbundling of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising from the Warsaw Uprising – something that even some historians have conflated although they were separate happenings.
Having said that, the story was disjointed and she went on ad nauseum on tangents with descriptions about beetles, buffalo and cows and forgot the real reason for telling this story. I was expecting more insight on the Zabinskis and their Guests and their feelings during this horrible experience, not a tutorial on bugs.
As a critical reader and writer myself, I could try to be generous and say that her interminable asides and lists were an attempt at imparting the complexity of an issue, or the obsessiveness of amassing a collection. But the attempts failed. Perhaps this was because the author tried to conflate poetry and prose (she is a poet) and did so unsuccessfully.
Also, a propos of poetry, her overblown and flowery prose started to grate on me. To wit: "In a darkness that deep, fireflies dance across eyes that see into themselves." To continue: "Meanwhile, the brain piped fugues of worry and staged mind-theaters full of tragedies and triumphs, because unfortunately, the fear of death does wonders to focus the mind, inspire creativity, and heighten the senses.” HUH? Sorry – but I don’t find this poetic – just schmaltzy. Her writing style, full of overblown metaphors is just distracting and even exasperating at times.

All in all this is an admirable and truly remarkable story and because she had access to primary sources, to Antonina's extraordinary diary, Ackerman could have done incredible justice to these characters. Instead, Antonina’s journal gets rather lost in long "whimsical" rambling passages of struggling to save the zoo during the ravages of WWII.

Filtered through Ackerman, I found them (the characters) flat and at times Antonina just plain silly. Her mysticism actually drove me up the wall. As did her going on and on about Polish “culture” and superstition. Jan and Antonina were educated people – like my parents. They would have found the superstitions of the uneducated to be quaint at best and laughable. I doubt that they would have embraced them, as Ackerman suggests. Perhaps they might have found them charming. But Ackerman is a mystical sort, and I think she conflates her own view of life onto these characters.
Also, the author’s priorities were just weird. She would write in great detail about playing the piano and the derivation of the piece, but she skimmed over the actual logistics of how these folks actually managed to harbor their guests and how they got to the zoo itself, or the details of how they lived once they got there. THIS was important, not the details of bugs. She never made clear how this underground activity was carried out.
This story deserved someone with more understanding, perhaps with better acquaintance with the subject at large. The story is not very well told, nor are the details of the circumstances given the importance they deserve. She really falls down in terms of conveying the actual suffering, terror, and horror of the German occupation and the Risings. There are many books that convey this suffering well: Rising ‘44, When God Looked the Other Way, The Civilian Population and the Warsaw Uprising of 1944, The Ice Road, Forgotten Holocaust, among others. She lists Rising ‘44 in her bib – but she couldn’t have read it too carefully. I was surprised to read other reviews in which readers talk about how appalled they were at the suffering and conditions, because as far as I was concerned, she did not render those well at all.
If they want a real picture of WW II and what that was like for the people in Europe, there are far better stories that portray this time far more accurately.(less)

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Feb 05, 2011 JG (The Introverted Reader) rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: 3_stars, author_american, biography_memoir, holocaust-genocide, non-fiction, read_in_2011, reviewed, setting_poland, world_war

Jan and Antonina Żabiński were the keepers of the Warsaw Zoo when Germany invaded Poland. Between the bombing, Nazi cruelty, and the Nazi desire to keep all of the rare animals for themselves, there quickly wasn't much of a zoo to keep. But Jan was an ingenious thinker and he came up with various ideas to keep the zoo complex under his care. From community gardens to a pig farm to a fur farm, he always had the zoo under his control. He was deeply involved in the Polish Underground, and as part o...more Jan and Antonina Żabiński were the keepers of the Warsaw Zoo when Germany invaded Poland. Between the bombing, Nazi cruelty, and the Nazi desire to keep all of the rare animals for themselves, there quickly wasn't much of a zoo to keep. But Jan was an ingenious thinker and he came up with various ideas to keep the zoo complex under his care. From community gardens to a pig farm to a fur farm, he always had the zoo under his control. He was deeply involved in the Polish Underground, and as part of his efforts, he moved hundreds of Jews through his zoo on the way to safer ground.

This wasn't exactly what I was expecting, and that was both good and bad. Generally coming at WWII through the Holocaust, I mainly think of Poland as the home of Auschwitz and the worst of the concentration camps. That's as far as I take it. I've never given any thought to the fact that Germany invaded Poland first and kept the Poles brutally repressed throughout the duration. Diane Ackerman showed me how bad it was for the Poles.

My problem was that I expected more of a narrative about life in the zoo, but the story was all over the place. There was actually very little about the zoo and the Jews in hiding there. A few who stayed for a while were written about, but that was about it. The rest of it bounced around a lot. There was a constant thread about the Żabiński family and how they made it through the war. But then there would be paragraphs about girl couriers helping the Underground, a pediatrician who refused to escape because he didn't want to leave the children in his orphanage, random people in the Underground and what their roles were, some animal behavior, some Warsaw battles, Polish superstitions, and backgrounds on a few of the Jews the Żabiński's helped. It sounds a little more coherent here, but with so many random paragraphs, it was hard for me to settle into a reading pace.

I will say that I had never heard of Janusz Korczak, the pediatrician I mentioned earlier. His story and the story of "his" children just broke my heart. I can see why "the Israelis revere him as one of the Thirty-Six Just Men whose pure souls make possible the world's salvation." He made the war easier for a lot of young souls and taught them gentleness in a world that had gotten insanely bloodthirsty. He marched with them and accompanied them and ultimately eased their passing into a better world.

Anyway, I also enjoyed the stories of the animals that lived with the Żabińskis. They found some truly eccentric characters who were full of personality. Badger in particular just tickled me to death. Why wouldn't a badger pay attention and teach himself to use a chamber pot? Oh, and Wicek the carnivorous rabbit was another favorite.

Obviously, there was a good story here that needed to be told. In fact there were a lot of good stories in here. That made the narrative feel very choppy and full of tangents for me. Still, these are people who should be remembered and I recommend it with reservations for that reason. They were truly Righteous Among the Nations. (less)

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Feb 08, 2012 Claire Caterer rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: nonfiction

During World War II, few cities were as horrific to live in as Warsaw. Seized by the Nazis in 1939, abandoned by their allies, Poland saw its capital turn overnight from a vibrant, cultural city of mixed population—30 percent were of Jewish descent—into a nightmare of German occupation. Yes, Paris and Amsterdam were occupied; London was blitzed. But Warsaw bled like no other. Its very spirit was crushed, its Jewish population herded into the ghetto, packed seven to a room. Nazi soldiers massacre...more During World War II, few cities were as horrific to live in as Warsaw. Seized by the Nazis in 1939, abandoned by their allies, Poland saw its capital turn overnight from a vibrant, cultural city of mixed population—30 percent were of Jewish descent—into a nightmare of German occupation. Yes, Paris and Amsterdam were occupied; London was blitzed. But Warsaw bled like no other. Its very spirit was crushed, its Jewish population herded into the ghetto, packed seven to a room. Nazi soldiers massacred their children, humiliated their elders, and eventually shipped hundreds of thousands to labor and concentration camps. These days, according to a recent Wikipedia article, Jews number about 1,000 in all of Poland, having been nearly eradicated from that country.

But horror of this magnitude produces heroism of equal magnitude, and herein lies the story of Antonina and Jan Zabinski, zookeepers who used their gutted enclosures to hide more than 300 Jews and helped transport them to safe havens outside of Warsaw. An active member of the Underground, Jan helped arrange for false identification papers, smuggled people out of the ghetto, and performed various acts of sabotage against the German occupiers. Meanwhile, Antonina maintained her household of revolving “Guests” and worked to keep up the spirits of her young son, who saw friends both animal and human fall victim to Hitler’s siege.

Diane Ackerman has done a remarkable job of recreating Antonina’s world from her memoirs, interviews, and other research. Each chapter details a pocket of this strange life, from brave characters to unusual friendships. From the terrifying initial capture of Warsaw to the horrors of the ghetto and at last the retreat of the German army, this story follows lives so closely that the reader feels she is looking over Antonina’s shoulder as she anxiously awaits her husband’s return each day. With taut, suspenseful, yet lyrical prose, Ackerman brings their situation to life even more vividly than the eight pages of photographs included.

As in Tatiana de Rosnay’s novel Sarah's Key, readers of The Zookeeper’s Wife know how the story ends. In fact, the story is so familiar to some of us that we forget these were real people, leading real day to day lives without knowing when, or if, the end was coming. These were people who risked their lives—their son—every day because they couldn’t see living any other way. One method of coping was to carry cyanide capsules always in their pockets. Death was that close.

While this tale will be difficult for those of us who have grown complacent and comfortable, it is vital to remember that we always have alternatives to permitting the impermissible. These stories remind us that even when the worst of humanity triumphs, the best of humanity is always waiting underneath, quietly simmering, not to be denied. By one estimate, some 20,000 Jews hid outside the ghetto in the city of Warsaw. Without the network of grocers, forgers, saboteurs, housekeepers, teachers, beauty salon owners, and others, those 20,000 people would have joined the rest of Jewish Warsaw at Treblinka. These are stories meant to uplift, but more than that, they should shame us into action. None of us is too weak to stand up to tyranny.

For more on books and writing, visit my blog.(less)

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Nov 09, 2008 Colleen rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Once in a while I luck upon a book that helps ground me. The Zookeeper's Wife was definitely one of those. It is more than an interesting work of history, more than a fascinating look into the past. It is a book that reminds us of hope in the middle of despair; that even when fear is a constant companion--the goodness and heroism of people can shine brightly; and how fortunate we are to live in this country, at this time, with the problems we face now, because there have been many periods and pl...more

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Aug 06, 2008 Sheila rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Being a history buff, I thought that I would like this book more than I did. It is an account of a real life couple that survived living in Warsaw, Poland during WWII. They ran the zoo in Warsaw before the war started. I found the Zabinskis, Polish Christians, very interesting and courageous people. They secretly harbored many Polish Jews that might have otherwise been carted off to the death camps.

The author, Diane Ackerman, is a good writer, but I felt like she kept steering off track. I read...more

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Apr 22, 2008 lisa rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This extraordinary story combines Ackerman's lovely talent for writing about nature and the amazing tale of the Jan and Antoinia Zabinski, who were running the Warsaw Zoo during WWII, where they helped hide hundreds of Jews fleeing the city. Ackerman uncovered many stories about the Underground resistance in Warsaw and describes many other courageous people in addition to the Zabinskis. She also writes about the Germans desire for not only cleansing the human race but also animal populations as...more

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Apr 22, 2008 Sarah rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

“The Zookeeper’s Wife” author Diane Ackerman is, not surprisingly, a poet and somewhat naturalist. These creative attributes are obvious once you start reading the book, which is written in such lovely descriptive and informative prose that you forgive the author for her tangential style of writing.

The book tells the true story of Jan and Antonina Zabinski, the zookeeper and his wife, respectively, whose Warsaw zoo is bombed in 1939 by the Germans, and who offer refuge to hundreds of Jewish peo...more

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Apr 22, 2008 Marni rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Diane Ackerman is one of my all time favorite non-fiction authors. Her Natural History of the Senses my favorite non fiction book. So when I discovered that her newest title was about a topic that I was always fascinated with--ordinary people rescuing the persecuted during the Holocaust--I was quite interested. Would her delicious use of vivid and literary language work with a dark topic as World War II? Her descriptions of the Zabinski's lives as they fought to survive and help other people and...more

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Apr 06, 2008 Jon rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition Recommends it for: WWII buffs, Zoo lovers, people visiting (or otherwise interested in) Warsaw

Shelves: pretty-good-books

"The Zookeeper's Wife" is the story of the Nazi attack, occupation and eventual defeat in Warsaw as told through the true story of Jan and Antonina Zabiniski, keepers of the Warsaw zoo.

Coming at 300+ pages, the book gives an excellent feel for the day-to-day life in Warsaw during WWII. The Zabiniski's find themselves actively participating in the Polish underground, providing shelter for many Jews as they struggle to preserve the buildings, flora and few remaining animals in the zoo.

Unfortunate...more

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Jan 20, 2009 Nancy rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: nonfiction

I really, really, really wanted to like this book. It's the true story of a Polish couple who hid Jews at their zoo in Poland during WWII. Their story itself is very heroic, but the writing style detracts from what is supposed to be the point of the novel. The author is frequently sidetracked with long passages of history, details about the lives of people not relevant to the story, and lengthy descriptions of nature (I skipped a good two pages or so that just listed different types of beetles)....more

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Mar 16, 2009 David Bales rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: 52-books-in-52-weeks

An interesting history about the director of the Warsaw Zoo and his family, who from 1939 to 1944 not only hid Jews and other Polish dissidents from the Nazis at the zoo, but also provided a staging area for the Polish Underground and home army. Their zoo was cleaned out by Nazi zoologists who wanted to "Aryanize" rare species of European animals by "breeding them back"; species like the European bison. A tale of heroism, bravery and treachery, on the part of the Germans.

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Mar 01, 2009 Melodi rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: historical-fiction, utah-bookclub

I quite enjoyed this book and reading about WWII from a different perspective of a zoo keeper and taking place in Poland. It wasn't depressing but discussed how the main characters hid Jews in the zoo cages and worked with the underground. It also discussed habits of animals randomly which I found interesting.

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About Diane Ackerman

Diane Ackerman received her B.A. in English from Penn State and an M.F.A. and Ph.D. in English from Cornell University in 1978. Her dissertation advisor was Carl Sagan. From 1980 to 1983 she taught English at the University of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. She has been married to novelist Paul West since 1970. She currently resides in Ithaca, New York. A collection of her manuscripts, writings and pap...more

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“I watched her face switch among the radio stations of memory” — 12 people liked it

“...he'd know about the role of mirror neurons in the brain, special cells in the premotor cortex that fire right before a person reaches for a rock, steps forward, turns away, begins to smile.Amazingly, the same neurons fire whether we do something or watch someone else do the same thing, and both summon similar feelings. Learning form our own mishaps isn't as safe as learning from someone else's, which helps us decipher the world of intentions, making our social whirl possible. The brain evolved clever ways to spy or eavesdrop on risk, to fathom another's joy or pain quickly, as detailed sensations, without resorting to words. We feel what we see, we experience others as self.” — 8 people liked it

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