The Terezin Diary of Gonda Redlich

by Saul S. Friedman (Editor)

Overview

In 1941, the fortress city of Terezin outside Prague was converted into an ostensibly "model" ghetto for Jews. Actually it was a way station to Auschwitz.

Gonda Redlich, who grew up in Moravia and became interested in youth work, was deported to Terezin in December 1941. The ghetto elders selected him to be in charge of the youth welfare department where he was responsible for the housing, care, and education of thousands of children who eventually passed through Terezin.

Before his own deportation to Auschwitz, Redlich concealed this diary in Terezin, where it was discovered in 1967. A significant document of Holocaust experience, it reveals the hope and despair of daily life in the ghetto.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780813184623
Publisher:	University Press of Kentucky
Publication date:	10/21/2021
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	192
File size:	450 KB
Age Range:	18 Years

Editorial Reviews

These recently discovered diaries were kept by a Czech Zionist youth leader during the nearly three years he spent in the Nazi's ``model ghetto,'' created outside Prague as a transit camp for Jews en route to death in the East. The book offers a poignant, detailed record of the inmates' daily struggle for survival and their painful pretense of leading a normal life. Copiously annotated by Youngstown State University history professor Friedman and ably translated by Kutler, a visiting professor of Hebrew at Kent State University, the diaries recount Redlich's heroic efforts to care for and educate Terezin's 15,000 children and his agony as a member of the Transport and Appeals committees, forced to help fill quotas that selected fellow inmates for deportation to Auschwitz and other death camps. His romantic, compassionate, hopeful spirit bravely denied and defied defeat until his own deportation, together with his wife and son, in October 1944. Photos not seen by PW. (Nov.)

Publishers Weekly - Publisher's Weekly

Redlich kept his diary in Hebrew and Czech while he was a resident of the ghetto established as a transit point for Jews bound for Auschwitz. He concealed it before his own deportation, and it was not discovered until 1967. Translated and thoroughly annotated, his compelling record of hope and despair is here made available. Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

Booknews

"Offers a poignant, detailed record of the inmates' daily struggle for survival. The diaries recount Redlich's heroic efforts to care for and educate Terezin's 15,000 children and his agony as a member of the Transport and Appeals committees, forced to help fill quotas that selected fellow inmates for deportation to Auschwitz and other death camps." — Publishers Weekly

From the Publisher