Book Bingo 2019 #2 'A book with themes of inequality'
The Librarian of Auschwitz
by
Antonio Iturbe
Publisher: Pan Macmillan
Publication date: 27th November 2018
Pages: 423
RRP: $18.99
Format Read: Paperback
Source: Courtesy of the publisher
Based on the experience
of real-life Auschwitz prisoner Dita Kraus, this is the incredible story
of a girl who risked her life to keep the magic of books alive during
the Holocaust.
Fourteen-year-old Dita is one of the many imprisoned by the Nazis at Auschwitz. Taken, along with her mother and father, from the TerezĂn ghetto in Prague, Dita is adjusting to the constant terror that is life in the camp. When Jewish leader Freddy Hirsch asks Dita to take charge of the eight precious volumes the prisoners have managed to sneak past the guards, she agrees. And so Dita becomes the librarian of Auschwitz.
Out of one of the darkest chapters of human history comes this extraordinary story of courage and hope
Fourteen-year-old Dita is one of the many imprisoned by the Nazis at Auschwitz. Taken, along with her mother and father, from the TerezĂn ghetto in Prague, Dita is adjusting to the constant terror that is life in the camp. When Jewish leader Freddy Hirsch asks Dita to take charge of the eight precious volumes the prisoners have managed to sneak past the guards, she agrees. And so Dita becomes the librarian of Auschwitz.
Out of one of the darkest chapters of human history comes this extraordinary story of courage and hope
The
Librarian of Auschwitz is based on the true story of Auschwitz prisoner Dita
Kraus. It is a story born of Dita’s experiences and the rich imagination of the
author.
The
story is set in the family camp at Auschwitz. The family camp was a cover the
Germans concocted to deceive the world as to what was really happening in
Auschwitz. While parents laboured during the day the children were gathered in
Block 31. The aim was for them to play games, sports and sing songs. Learning
was prohibited. Dita Adler, 14 years old, was the caretaker of the clandestine
children’s library consisting of eight books. If the Germans ever found out
about these books it would mean instant death.
The
main theme of the story is how books and reading are something to be cherished
and our right to read is something to risk death over. Dita protected these
books with her life, lovingly restoring them and handing them out to the
teachers each day.
The
story follows Dita and her mother, Liesl, as they are taken to Auschwitz and
the daily life in the family camp through sickness, death, hunger and fear as
thousands of prisoners come and go in the camps around them.
The
true violence of Auschwitz is very low key in this story which makes me feel it
would be suited to a younger audience as a first introduction to the atrocities
of the time, 13 years +. That’s not to say there is no violence, a prisoner is
hung and a girl beaten.
The
story had a lot of telling which caused it to lack emotion and I felt distanced
from the suffering until the last 100 pages of the book where it became so much
more immersive.
The
Librarian of Auschwitz is impeccably translated to English by Lilit Zekulin
Thwaites.
Iturbe
includes a moving postscript which explains his reason for writing the book and
his meeting with the woman that inspired this story, Dita herself, who is still
as strong, outspoken and passionate in her eighties as she was as a young girl.
You
can never, ever read too many stories about Auschwitz.
My Rating 3.5/5 ⭐⭐⭐½
*This review is:
Book 'L' in the AtoZ challenge
and part of #BookBingo2019 with Mrs B's Book Reviews & Theresa Smith Writes
Antonio
Iturbe lives in Spain, where he is both a novelist and a journalist.
About
the translator:
Lilit
Zekulin Thwaites is an award-winning literary translator. After thirty years as
an academic at La Trobe University in Australia, she retired from teaching and
now focuses primarily on her ongoing translation and research projects.
