3 comments about T. S. Eliot, Anti-Semitism and Literary Form, Second Edition.

1. Anthony Julius has written the most objective and informative work to date on the anti-semitic aesthetics of Eliot's early poetry. Though the author is an admirer of Eliot, he is not the least bit apologetic about his attempts to come to the grips with the literary consequences of an anti-semitic aesthetic. Julius takes a cue from deconstruction when he notes that any attempts to remove or downplay anti-semitic elements in Eliot's poetry will only serve to destroy the thematic body of Eliot's vast literary corpus. Julius also takes aim at the prose works of Eliot, thereby showing that Eliot's anti-semitism was not a phase (as most critics and scholars have argued since the post WWII period); rather, it was an integral poetic topoi. Finally, the author documents T.S. Eliot's association with fellow Anti-semite Ezra Pound and the latter's role in suppressing and expunging the anti-semitic "Dirge" from the finished portion of "The Wasteland." In closing, please believe me when I tell you that I thoroughly enjoyed reading and re-reading this book. I have yet to find anything questionable about the author's research or his methodology. To scholars and students who are interested in the life and writings of T.S. Eliot, I say to all of you: BUY AND READ THIS BOOK!



2. I studied the work of Elliot in graduate school. I knew the Anti- Semitic passages, and thus held myself distant from the cult of Elliot worship. Nonetheless reading Julius' deeper probing into Eliot's Anti-Semitism I am angry at myself for not being more outraged. It turns out that Eliot did not want Jewish readers. He scorned us.
   The lines of 'Burbank with a Baedaker, Bleisten with a cigar' and other lines from 'Gerontion' would fit in well with Nazi propaganda.
   Apparently Eliot was as Julius points out a 'literary anti- Semite' whose hate and scorn were for the 'free -thinking sceptical Jews' he believed the enemies of Christian civilization. On a personal level he apparently was able to bear Jewish company, here and there.
   Julius shows how the Anti- Semitism is not a passing theme of youth but also pervades his later prose work.
   I believe that after reading this work it is impossible to read Eliot again without feeling moral repulsion.



3. The dishonest approach used by Julius throughout this book is characterized by the quotation on page xiii that refers to a personal confrontation in South Africa between Eliot and a Mrs. Millen. The confrontation simply never happened. Julius refers to this item several times in the body of the text. He explains the fabrication in a footnote as "at best, a melodramatic and telescoped version of the truth." No, it is a lie. It refers to a meeting that never happened and the quote has not been removed or changed in the revised edition.
   When one carefully checks each and every source note (and they are profuse) in analyzing the anti-semitic "quotes" attributed to Eliot by Julius it emerges that the actual sources are not Eliot but snippets from other anti-semitic tracts carefully juxtaposed by Julius to give the impression they are Eliot's. This casts a pall of mendacity of the entire enterprise. These sorts of tactics are unncessary and raise questions of integrity.
   The book consists of the intricately wrought polemics of a clever barrister who seeks to give the appearance of a scholarly investigation accompanied by much hand-wringing about being "fair" to Eliot. It would take another dissertation the length of Julius's original to completely debunk many of his specious claims. Don't let the copious notes fool you. Each and every one needs to be checked.
   This book, more than any other, has damaged Eliot's stature and reputation. Some young scholar should spend the time necessary to refute it.

No comments about Sentenced to Remember: My Legacy of Life in Pre-1939 Poland and Sixty-Eight Months of Nazi Occupation.

2 comments about Surviving Despair: A Story About Perseverance.

1. I finished reading "Surviving Despair" yesterday; it took a while because I wanted to go slowly and absorb the historical information. Also, there were so many times I just had to stop because the tears blurred the words. It is such a powerful story with so much sadness, mixed in with some happiness and hope. It is a remarkable document of an unimaginable time in history.
   
   David was so reluctant to share with others (even his own family) the trauma and tragedies in his life. Yet, he obviously shared so much with the author, Herman Taube.
   
   David's relationship (or lack of) with his sons and grandchildren was so disturbing. I wonder if Uriel had married a Jewish woman and had Michael been straight would it have been easier to connect with his sons. I think not. I think his sons were too much a reminder of the children he lost in the fire.
   
   The book also reinforced the role of the US Holocaust Memorial Museum in the lives of the survivors.For so many survivors, the museum is their voice. David certainly found new purpose in his life at the museum.
   
   Thank you, Herman, David and Rose for this precious gift



2. Herman's descriptions are so good that you feel you're right there with the main character watching the moments of his life unfold and seeing him persevere through all the horrors of the war and the holocaust and beyond. The story follows a boy from a small village in Poland, where he grew up before the war, to separation from his family, flight to Russia, and his attempt to make a life after all his losses.

1 comments about Unveiled Shadows: The Witness of a Child.

1. Young Ingrid Kisliuk survived the Nazis in Vienna, Austria and again as her family found refuge in Belgium. While the events of this period are well-known, what is special about her autobiography is that she uses a Socratic dialogue to contrast the details of her story as a hidden child with the questions an inquiring adult mind raises in hindsight. She is able to give us a detailed recollection of her extended family's daily life: how they lived and work and hid from the expanding presence of soldiers and anti-Semites. One episode tells of the raid of their Brussels apartment, a cramped garret studio. Downstairs was a basement workroom where her father did piecework crafting rabbit skins into toys. Hearing soldiers arrive on their block she and another family member scurried into a cupboard in the workroom and escaped being captured. The author describes this trauma and many other equally stressful and dangerous times and how she thinks and feels about them today. She analyzes the motivations of the other people in her life then: why did they make the choices they did? Ingrid Kisliuk's memoir is a courageous personal history, a document of World War II and a valuable contribution to Jewish history.

No comments about My Years in Theresienstadt: How One Woman Survived the Holocaust.

1 comments about Oskar Schindler and His List: The Man, the Book, the Film, the Holocaust and Its Survivors.

1. The book kept me interested but it wasnt edge of the seat action but i would definately recommend it

1 comments about Letters and Dispatches 1924-1944.

1. The Letters and Dispatches of Raoul Wallenberg provide a glimpse of a man who paid, somewhere and somehow in the Soviet Union, the ultimate price for his efforts to bring others to safety. While much is now debated about the benefits of neutrality to Sweden during the Holocaust, what cannot be debated is the intentionality of this man to provide Hungarian Jews a safe haven in Sweden, saving them from Hitler's death camps. An excellent read, this work provides insight through Raoul's own words and the responses of those he wrote to. Introductions to the letters and dispatches provide an excellent framework, assisting the reader with historical perspective, relational understanding and context.

3 comments about The Blood Tattoo.

1. This book is the story of a young lady, that survived the Holocaust. With her mother and one out of three brothers she survived. Her mother would have been died if it worent for a Jewish Kopo who keep the secret of a her surviving mother. I personally experienced the story of this strong at heart lady, she visited my school as a volunteer Holocaust survivor.



2. Okay, Okay...you'll say I'm biased because it tells my Aunt's story and how she survived together with my most loving grandmother after removal from their home, imprisonment in a ghetto, and then the train deportation to Auschwitz. I have loaned my copy to so many people and each person returns it to me stunned. It is truly a gripping story and you will know my aunt through this book--she will touch you too. Please buy it, read it and then loan it to someone who wants or needs to learn more about modern man's greatest atrocity.



3. I am from the UK and have had great priveledge in meeting Ebi and becoming a friend to her. She has been my inspiration in devloping my knowledge on the Holocaust. Her book evokes all the emotions one can imagine. She has written from the heart and when one reads her book one can anly imagine what she and her family were going through. A must read. Thankyou Ebi for sharing your story with us, I know it must have been a harrowing experience when you wrote this but I am so glad you did.

4 comments about You Must Live: A Physician Remembers the Holocaust.

1. A harrowing tale of one man's struggle to survive first, government sanctioned discrimination and, finally, its brutal efforts to exterminate an entire group of people. It is told in a simple, gut wrenching, straightforward style unencumbered by the embellishments of a ghostwriter. The fact that Dr. Goldenberg not only survived the darkest days of the twentieth century, but went on to live a life of service to his fellow man is a tribute to the innate will to live, and to him, personally. It is a powerful lesson for all.

   That this reader admits to having a favorably biased opinion of the author is easily explained... he has been my physician for the past forty years.




2. This book was written by my father, and I have seen the trauma of his life during these years all through my growing up. Reading about his life during the war helped me to understand more about what made him the person he is today.

   This graphic representation will not be for everyone but it is definitely worth a read for those interested in personal observations and experiences of the Holocaust




3. I read this book before it ever hit the shelves. This book was written by my Grandfather- in fact it was written for my family so we understood what it was like. Grandpa is a wonderful man- and this book- even if it wasn't written by family, was powerful, because it relived a horrible time. If you have any intrest in teh holocaust- this is a read you really don't want to miss.



4. Dr. Goldenberg's experiences and feelings are conveyed with clarity and emotion. This slim affected me more powerfully than some other Holocaust memoirs I have read - not because it is any more horrifying than other accounts, but because of the way Dr. Goldenberg was able to survive, and surmount so much in the end. I was also struck by the frankness with which he writes of the unendurable. Perhaps most moving of all, however, is the transcript of his remarks to his family in 1985, found at the end of his book - a reminder of why we must never allow the Holocaust to be forgotten. Besides adults, this would be an excellent book for adolescents, or anyone learning about the Holocaust, to read.

No comments about We Just Want To Live Here: A Palestinian Teenager, an Israeli Teenager, An Unlikely Friendship.