Holocaust

I first read this book in 1978, after seeing the NBC miniseries. It started a lifelong interest in the Nazi regime and the Holocaust. The dialogue in the book is a little awkward but the book shows the perspectives of a German Jewish family and a mediocre German lawyer who becomes a Nazi and eventually takes part in the planning of the Final Solution.

For someone wanting to learn more about Nazi anti-Semitism and the Holocaust, this is a useful place to start. It discusses the anti-Semitic laws that were passed in the 30's, Kristallnacht, the euthanasia programs, the Warsaw Ghetto uprising, etc. The book is fiction but all of these things actually happened.

So many books have been written about the holocaust. What makes this one different is that Gerald Green tells the story from both sides: one is the story of a young Jew, Rudy Weiss, harrowing escape from Germany and his family's unsuccessful attempts to survive the Nazi regime and the diary of Erik Dorf, a drifting young German, who becomes a powerful Nazi administrator at the urging of his wife, slowly indoctrinated into the regime. The two men are connected by Rudy's father, who was a caring doctor, who treated Dorf's wife and by the Weiss family's piano. Amazing that this book has not received more notoriety.

Tale of 2 families: one an SS officer with murderous rage; the other, a young Jewish victim

When The Holy Spirit led me to pick up this book and start readinng it, I was angry at the Jews for their weakness and passive behavior during such blatant pursecution. I was stunned at their ability to fool themselves, even till the end. Several chapters in I realized that my own race has done the same thing for hundreds of years. More importantly, the WORLD goes gullably along with dictators who spew rhetoric, insight hate, and strive for total domination. I held me tears until the end. But I'll never be able to hold my peace again!

Gerald Green has concentrated on the history of the Holocaust for many years & written 2 previous books on the subject. Artists of Terezin & The Legion of the Noble Christians.

The scene is 1935 Berlin, where Dr Weiss is a physician and Erik Dorf a struggling young lawyer. It's a tale of their two families during the war.

I have the 1978 hardcover edition

Questo romanzo ha sconvolto e commosso milioni di lettori nel mondo. Ha riaperto vecchie ferite cancerose, acceso violenti dibattiti, provocato discussioni ad ogni livello, aperto soprattutto gli occhi a chi non poteva (o voleva) credere allo sterminio ebraico, alla tragedia più grande della cosiddetta civiltà umana. Con questo spietato libro, 6 milioni di vittime innocenti hanno trovato un autore: Gerald Green, un ebreo americano ha scritto infatti la loro spaventosa odissea seguendo le vicissitudini di una sola famiglia e assurgendola a simbolo di tutte le altre oppresse, smembrate, violentate e uccise nei più barbari modi nel periodo tra il 1938 e il 1945.
Pagine di una sconvolgente tensione riveleranno i segreti, terribili show more risvolti di un pensiero ossessivo, diventato programma politico, che ha evidenziato un aspetto raggelante della natura umana: in determinate condizioni si può creare un rapporto mostruoso fra gli uomini, divisi in vittime e carnefici e non solo a livello personale, ma a quello di massa.
L'enormità del fatto, oggi argomento di discussione a livello sociale, e politico, balza con impressionante evidenza dalle vicende descritte in OLOCAUSTO da cui, ricordiamo, è stata tratta la serie televisiva che tanto successo e clamore ha destato anche in Italia. show less

a devastating reading experience