The Librarian of Auschwitz by Antonio Iturbe

Dita Kraus survived Theresienstadt, Auschwitz and Bergen-Belsen. She and her mother were  moved to Belsen just before it was  liberated. Her mother died just before the liberators would have repatriated them. Whilst in Auschwitz Dita was part of the school that is organised in Block 31. It wasn’t supposed to be a school – just a place where children could be entertained. Dita was responsible for looking after the eight books they had acquired.  

Antonio Irurbe gives us much interesting detail about how the camp worked with particular reference for Block 31. As well as the physical books, there were living books; these were adults who would relate stories to the children. Pencils were created by shaving splinters of wood to a point and then charring the ends of them.  The children could only write a few words with these makeshift pencils. They were sharpened by the handle of a spoon that had been filed to make a point. 

It is probable that Block 31 was kept as a show case as a visit from the Red Cross was expected, Once it became clear that the Red Cross was no longer coming the children’s room was dismantled.  

We also have graphic details about Belsen in the last days. Many of the inmates of this part of Auschwitz were moved to Belsen in the panic that ensued as the Germans realised that they were losing the war. This camp was largely abandoned and the inmates more or less left to rot. Iturbe takes the liberty of allowing Dita to come across Anne and Margot Frank. Is that really likely? 

This is a fictional account but Irurbe worked closely with the real Dita. She herself tells us that “he also collected facts from other sources” (Dita’s forward to the English translation). 

He also includes accounts of other characters who lived in the camp. This may detract for the reader who just wants a story, as we don’t get quite so close to these characters as we do to Dita, but could be important for the scholar.               

Concentration Camps

Concentration Camps are different form Death Camps. As their name suggests, they are where concentrated groups of people were held. Clara Lehrs and possibly Karl Schubert in the Hani strand of our story went to concentration camps.

Neither Renate, Hani nor the other German girls were very aware of what these were or how bad the conditions were in them. They were probably more aware of the idea of a work camp. Renate may have been familiar with these in England too, for some fellow Germans were interned. 

Charlotte Delbo - Auschwitz and After

This is a really moving book. It is in translation and I’m not really sure why I didn’t read it in its original French. Nevertheless, it seems to have been translated well.  

Charlotte Delbo, Auschwitz survivor, presents a series of poems, vignettes and prose poems about her experiences of Auschwitz and after, and of the experiences of others she knows.

Auschwitz is always with her.

She doesn’t colour her accounts with memory or with trying to explain what it was all about. She recreates the feeling of the place and of the experience and brings some immediacy to her readers.

I found myself resisting reading this at times. I didn’t want to confront the darkness. It is anything but a comfortable read.

The disorientation that she and others she knew felt after release was remarkable. Nothing seems all that important. Some habits from the camp cannot be lost. In some cases it was too soon to form new relationships and then became too late.  

A few particular passages really stand out.

She recalls having to count the dead every day. One day they see Alice’s leg. Alice had a false leg. Seeing the detached leg indicates that Alice has died.

She describes a Christmas Eve in the camp. They manage to have a feast of vegetables and put on a little home-made make-up.

Charlotte manages to buy a copy of Molière’s Le Misanthrope. They put on a performance in the camp. Charlotte also learns the play off by heart. She recites it to herself – sometimes up to three times - during roll call.

In the passage about Gilberte, the reader really can feel the disorientation after release. Gilberte is even afraid to leave her hotel room.

Delbo brings us close to understanding what it was like to be there. This seems to work better than fiction or autobiography written from memory.     

Sonderkommando

I’ve been looking at some documents and film footage today about this rather disturbing group who played a significant role in the Holocaust. At first they were mistaken as Nazi collaborators. They did indeed work with the Nazis. They would show other Jews into the gas chambers, pull them out afterwards, help with the burning of the corpses, cut off women’s hair, and sort clothing and jewellery. However, they did not volunteer for these duties. They were forced to do them. If they refused, they would be killed in a particular nasty way.

Many Jews realised what was happening. Able-bodied young men were picked for this job and though many of them would rather die than do this work, if they refused, they would not die comfortably.   

The SS actually did the killing and it was the Sonderkommando’s duty to help cover up the Nazi crimes and recoup as much material wealth form the Jews as possible.

One group did rebel and there was an uprising at Auschwitz where one of the crematoria was destroyed. They had been helped in this by a young woman who had managed to smuggle small quantities of gunpowder form a munitions plant.             

Maurice Rossel and Richard Glazar

I’ve been reading about these two today. Rossel was a Red Cross inspector who was fooled by a staged Theriesenstadt. The Germans had turned the three tier bunks into to two tier ones. They’d made everything look pleasant. However, I still wonder why the International Red Cross could think it in any way right for human beings to be held there against their will? He went on an unannounced visit to Auschwitz and was not shown around. There should have been some sort of clue in that. As an older man, he admits to being naïve when he was young.

 Glazar was an inmate but also employed at Treblinka. The Germans concluded that it was best to have someone experienced to deal with the killings, the corpses and the sorting of clothes and jewellery – and gold teeth. It was because he did that job that he was allowed to live. The transports slowed in 1943. If people weren’t arriving at the camp there would be no work for him and therefore he would also be killed. So, he escaped.

Particularly gruesome were his descriptions of how the old people were led directly from the trains through a sort of funnel into the “showers” where they were gassed with carbon monoxide. Presumably this is what happened to Clara Lehrs.