IN THIS “MEMORY DAY” THEY REMEMBER THOSE DARK YEARS DURING WHICH MANY INNOCENTS LOST THEIR LIVES. THE BEST WAY TO REMEMBER IS TO RELIVE THOSE TRAGIC STORIES THROUGH THE VOICES OF THOSE WHO WERE THERE AND CONTINUE TO TELL, SO AS NOT TO FORGET
“Shoah” is a Hebrew term reported from the Bible to indicate “disaster”, “destruction”. And it is the destruction of the human being that is remembered on January 27th “Remembrance Day”. The date refers to the liberation of the concentration camp Auschwitz by Soviet troops, the day on which the testimonials of those who had survived the horror of the Nazi genocide.
«The Wandelweg is immersed in the sun, in the pure, first, young light. The buds swell, the water shimmers. Forbidden for Jews. But who can take away this pleasure, this desire for spring life? Doubly enjoyed, because the desire is stronger than the prohibition – he wrote Carla Simons, Dutch author of Jewish origin, in her “The light dances restlessly. Diary 1942-43” -. I think, when I see the birds fluttering: after this winter, which seemed so long, so brutal, so bitter, not all the birds are dead. Not all plants froze to death, not all people died. The feeling of life arises pure in me: to experience this sweet exhilaration, it was worth facing the winter».
The importance of “Memory” according to Lia Levi
What happened violated what makes us human, an outrage that must never happen again and must not be forgotten. And this commemoration of all those who lost their lives in defense of their identity, every year, helps us to remember.
«There is a difference between memories and memory – has explained Lia Leviwriter, journalist and survivor ofHolocaust -. Memory starts from memories. Process memories. It is memory that creates depth to one’s ego, it becomes part of our DNA. This is why it is important to convey this concept, especially to younger people».
And that of Lia Levi is one of the voices that can tell that horror. He gives a demonstration of her in his literary debut “A little girl and that’s it”whose story is autobiographical, and continues in his many fictional novels where, however, the atmosphere often refers to the years of his childhood, to that historical context which he confesses is «the one best known but least understood».
In his career there is no shortage of essays and training stories aimed at children such as “Remembrance Day told to my grandchildren“whose “nephews” he is addressing are the many students with whom he dialogues in the many meetings organized in Italian schools and whose questions, even when simple, inspired the text.
The indelible memory of the writer Edith Bruck
Another voice, or rather writing, in which every word is precise, granitic and thoughtful, but is never hateful, because hate poisons and she does not want to be poisoned, is that of Edith Bruck.
The writer is of Hungarian origins, winner of the Young Witch Award with his novel “The lost bread”. This title recalls an indelible memory of her, the memory of that bread that her mother had prepared in the oven the day the Hungarian fascists came to take them. She had let it rise the previous night and it was ready for cooking, which however never happened.
And so, at the age of only thirteen, Edith Bruck was deported to Auschwitz and then to other camps, Dachau and Bergen-Belsen, from which she was freed in April 1945. She lost her mother, brother and father. It was she and her sister who survived. But even after returning to her family, her return to her life was difficult. During the journey she searched for her own “casa”, from Israel to various European capitals up to Italy, where it finally planted roots in Rome.
Capturing humanity even in tragedy
Looking back, Edith Bruck said that five people saved her gestures of humanity.
«We were in Auschwitz when I was torn from my mother: I clung to her with my nails. It was the most atrocious moment, but there was nothing that could be done and right at that moment I saw the first light – confesses the writer in an interview with Corriere della Sera -. The soldier who was violently pulling me, ordered me to “go to the right”, then I understood why: my mother was destined for the crematoriums, while on the right there were the forced labor areas where I was diverted, a modicum of mercy.
I saw the second light in Dachau. We girls were used as servants in the kitchen of a castle, outside the camp, where the German officers were staying: for us a heavenly place, because we secretly managed, every now and then, to steal something to eat. The chef, a German, asked me: “What’s your name?”. I didn’t know what to answer, we weren’t people, we were skeletons without hair. We didn’t have a name, we were a number, mine was 11152. The cook approaches me and tells me that he had a little girl like me. So he takes a comb out of his pocket and gives it to me».
Edith Bruck and the Memory of those days
«The third light: another soldier, one day, slams his mess tin on me, ordering me to wash it. But he knew that, deep down, there was some of his jam left, which he had left for me – continua Edith Bruck -. The fourth light was when an overseer gave me his glove with a hole in it. And finally the fifth light, the most important.
We were in Bergen-Belsen and we were forced to carry on our shoulders the heavy jackets of the soldiers who were at the station, leaving for the front. But we had to travel many kilometers, there and back, in the cold, in the snow. At a certain point I could no longer support that weight. Together with others we began to throw them on the ground. A soldier comes towards us shouting and asking us who had thrown down the jackets, threatening to shoot everyone.
I took a step forward. Anyway, one way or another, you had to die. The soldier breaks my ear and, in pain, I fall to the ground bleeding. My sister, who was at my side, jumps on the German, who first points a gun at me, then extends a hand to help me get up. I was totally amazed, astonished but I found myself standing».
In “Mirrors” from a room to an entire life
An intense story that Edith Bruck continues to bear witness to, to young students, to the youngest and to the world, also through her works, as in “Mirrors”an opera released in 2005 and republished by History and Literature Editions along with an unpublished interview with him.
This poem originates precisely from the need to reconstruct excerpts of the past and present. Everything happens through the objects in a room which, as in a succession of mirrors, tell the author the itinerary of her life. Thus unfold the stories of those who have completed a great journey, profoundly marked by Nazi extermination campsand who returns to his childhood, and then digresses in time.