Hope in Darkness: The Aba Gefen Diaries

by Aba Gefen, Ina Friedman (Translator)

A diary kept during World War II recounts how the author and his younger brother struggled to survive while evading the Nazis in German-occupied Lithuania by living an underground existence

184 pages, Paperback

First published March 1, 1990

Reviews

[Meaghan · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is well worth a read, especially if you want to know about the experiences of Jews in hiding. Aba Gefen, a young Lithuanian Jew, wrote in his diary nearly every day from 1942, when he went to live with a peasant family, until the Russians liberated the area in 1944. He was obviously a very intelligent young man (he went on to get a PhD) and concerned with recording not only his own experiences but those of the other people in the area.

What I find intriguing is that even though Lithuanians were supposed to be rabid anti-Semites -- something around 95% of their Jewish population perished in the Holocaust -- Gefen's presence in the village was an open secret and he went from household to household, asking for a little food or a place to stay for awhile, without being betrayed.

I only wish the book had included more information about Gefen himself. A short introduction describes the Nazi invasion of Lithuania in mid-1941, but there's very little info on Gefen's family background or pre-war life, and nothing at all about his post-war life except what's in the about-the-author blurb on the back cover. The book simply ends with an entry saying the Russians have arrived.

(BTW, I recorded the story of the death of Shimon Cohen, as written in Gefen's diary, in the Executed Today blog.)