Remembering the holocaust

Over the past few weeks I’ve been reading some books about the holocaust. I never dreamed that all this would become so relevant.

Art Spiegelman’s graphic memoir Maus (UK) (US) is brilliant, devastating, and occasionally very funny. Spiegelman’s father and mother, Vladek and Anja, survived Auschwitz against dreadful odds. Anja later killed herself. The contrast between the elderly Vladek – weak, needy, apparently socially clueless – and the younger Vladek – strong, ingenious, and socially nimble – is striking. And the details come alive in Spiegelman’s brutally direct telling.

Elie Wiesel’s Night (UK) (US) seems to be required reading in the US but I’d not read it until recently. It’s simple, excellent, unremittingly bleak. I think the figure of Moishe the Beadle – who has witnessed an atrocity but cannot get any of his fellow Jews to believe him – is the most tragic I’ve ever encountered. Grim and brilliant.

Viktor Frankl’s Man’s Search For Meaning (UK) (US) has, I’m told, changed people’s lives. Like Wiesel, Frankl survived life the camps. Unlike Wiesel he has a message of inspiration and redemption. It’s an interesting contrast. (Both books are very short.)

Then there’s Anne Frank’s Diary of a Young Girl. (UK) (US) It’s heartbreaking.

I’m glad I read these books. I’ll be reading others – histories as well as memoirs.