Passage to Freedom: The Sugihara Story

by Ken Mochizuki

Overview

In 1940, a Japanese diplomat in Lithuania issued thousands of visas to Jewish refugees--against the order of his government--to allow them to flee the Nazis.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781417618903
Publisher:	Turtleback Books
Publication date:	09/28/2003
Edition description:	Bound for Schools & Libraries ed.
Pages:	32
Product dimensions:	9.80(w) x 7.80(h) x 0.40(d)
Lexile:	AD610L (what's this?)
Age Range:	6 - 9 Years

About the Author

Ken Mochizuki is a writer, journalist, and former actor who made his picture-book debut with Baseball Saved Us. He is also the author of several other award-winning picture books published by Lee & Low, including Passage to Freedom and Heroes. Mochizuki lives in Maple Valley, Washington. His website is kenmochizuki.com.

Dom Lee made his picture-book debut with Baseball Saved Us. He grew up in Seoul, South Korea, and went on to illustrate books in both the United States and Korea. His titles for Lee & Low include Ken Mochizuki's Passage to Freedom and Heroes, as well as the award-winning Sixteen Years in Sixteen Seconds. Lee's unique illustration style involves applying encaustic beeswax on paper, then scratching out images, and finally coloring the images with oil paint. Lee and his wife live in Hollis, New York.

Editorial Reviews

Mochizuki and Lee's (Baseball Saved Us) skillful volume pays tribute to Chiune Sugihara, a Japanese diplomat posted to Lithuania who in 1940 saved the lives of thousands of Polish Jews. Defying orders from his government, Sugihara handwrote visas for weeks to grant refugees passage through the Soviet Union to Japan. Told in the voice of his then-five-year-old son, the narrative centers upon the boy's impressions: the creaking of the bedsprings as his sleepless father tossed and turned, the Jewish children huddled outside the consulate, his mother massaging her husband's cramped arm. Lee's precise, haunting art, created by scratching out images from beeswax applied to paper and then adding oil paint and colored pencil, has the look of sepia-toned photographs: it unites carefully balanced compositions and emotional intensity. Mochizuki and Lee's inspired treatment brings out the import of Sugihara's brave and compassionate decision. An afterword by Sugihara's son updates the account: the family spent 18 months in a Soviet internment camp, and his father was stripped of his diplomatic post. A stirring story. Ages 4-up. (May)

Publishers Weekly - Publisher's Weekly

Gr 2-6The story of a Japanese diplomat who saved thousands of Jewish refugees in defiance of official government orders. This little-known Schindler-like account is effectively narrated in first-person style, ostensibly by young Hiroki Sugihara, son of the man who was Japanese consul in Lithuania in 1940. As Nazi soldiers invaded Poland, many Jews crossed the border to Lithuania and hundreds besieged the Japanese consulate for travel visas. Three times, Hiroki's father requested permission from his government to issue visas and was refused. He decided to follow his conscience and obey the dictates of God, rather than his government. For the next month, until he was reassigned to Berlin, he issued and personally signed visas, from dawn to dark, while hundreds stood in line for their passage to freedom. An afterword by Hiroki Sugihara tells of the subsequent history of his family. For children, this story will be a lesson in courage and conscience and a valuable addition to Holocaust materials. For those who have some knowledge of the Japanese/German Axis pact, the remarkable actions of Consul Chiune Sugihara carry an added dimension of heroism and brotherhood above and beyond political pressures. Lee's dramatic full-page, sepia-colored illustrations focus on the faces of the Japanese consul and his family, the Jewish men and women appealing for help, and the children, whose fate lay in the hands of the adults, men and women of different races and cultures caught in a fearful time.Shirley Wilton, Ocean County College, Toms River, NJ

School Library Journal

* "Mochizuki and Lee's inspired treatment brings out the import of Sugihara's brave and compassionate decision... A stirring story." — Publishers Weekly, starred review

"Lee's stirring mixed-media illustrations in sepia shades are humane and beautiful; they capture the intensity of those days-when the crowds were at the gate and one man wrote and wrote the visas by hand-from the child's viewpoint. The immediacy of the narrative will grab kids' interest." — Booklist

"This simple but stirring tale of courage and compassion seen through the eyes of a child is a unique contribution to holocaust literature for young readers." — The Horn Book

"This is the kind of hard-hitting book that demands to be read-aloud and discussed, as it initiates powerful feelings about prejudice, humanness and integrity that need to be part of every child's learning. In this third collaboration of author and illustrator, Mochizuki and Lee have proven themselves to be a powerful team." — The Children's Book Review

Blue Ribbon List - Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books
Bluestem Award - Association of Illinois School Library Educators
CCBC Choices - Cooperative Children's Book Center (CCBC)
California Young Reader Medal Nominee
Jane Addams Children's Book Award Honor - Jane Addams Peace Association
National Jewish Book Award Finalist - Jewish Book Council
Notable Books for a Global Society - International Literacy Association (ILA)
Notable Books in the Language Arts - National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE)
Notable Social Studies Trade Books for Young People - National Council for the Social Studies (NCSS)
Teachers' Choices - International Literacy Association (ILA)
Texas Bluebonnet Award Shortlist - Texas Library Association (TLA)

From the Publisher