Life and Loss in the Shadow of the Holocaust: A Jewish Family's Untold Story

ISBN-13: 9780521899918 / Angielski / Twarda / 2011 / 350 str.

Rebecca Boehling

Opis

A family's recently-discovered correspondence provides the inspiration for this fascinating and deeply-moving account of Jewish family life before, during and after the Holocaust. Rebecca Boehling and Uta Larkey reveal how the Kaufmann-Steinberg family was pulled apart under the Nazi regime and left divided between Germany, the US and Palestine. The family's unique eight-way correspondence across two generations brings into sharp focus the dilemma of Jews in Nazi Germany facing the painful decision of when and if they should leave Germany. The authors capture the family members' fluctuating emotions of hope, optimism, resignation and despair as well as the day-to-day concerns, experiences and dynamics of family life despite increasing persecution and impending deportation. Headed by two sisters who were among the first female business owners in Essen, the family was far from conventional, and their story contributes a new dimension to our understanding of life in Germany during these dark years.

Recenzje

'Life and Loss in the Shadow of the Holocaust offers a richly-textured account of the Kaufmann-Steinberg family during the Second World War. Expertly illuminated by Rebecca Boehling and Uta Larkey, it is based on an extraordinarily full set of correspondence between family members with diverse perspectives. Among the many strengths of this superb study is the extent to which it challenges persistent notions concerning gender roles, relations with non-Jewish Germans, and attitudes toward traditional Judaism within German Jewry.' Michael Berkowitz, author of The Crime of My Very Existence: Nazism and the Myth of Jewish Criminality

Spis treści

1. Introduction; 2. German-Jewish lives from Emancipation through the Weimar Republic; 3. Losing one's business and citizenship: the Geschwister Kaufmann, 1933–1938; 4. Professional roadblocks and personal detours: Lotti and Marianne, 1933–1938; 5. The November Pogrom (1938) and its consequences for Kurt and his family; 6. New beginnings in Palestine, 1935–1939: Lotti and Kurt; 7. Rescuing loved ones trapped in Nazi Germany, 1939–1942; 8. Wartime rumors and postwar revelations; 9. Epilogue.

O autorze

Boehling, Rebecca Rebecca Boehling is Professor of History and Director of the Dresher Center for the Humanities at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County. Larkey, Uta Uta Larkey is Associate Professor of German Studies at Goucher College, Baltimore.