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Resources for Children of Holocaust Survivors |
| Children of Survivors Speak |
editor's note: Is your work missing from this list? please email me with the information! Thanks! -J
A Reflection of My Family of Origin: The Algava/Seror Family "The Holocaust: An Obligation to Remember". Progress: Family Systems Resarch and Therapy, 1997, Volume 6, (pp. 109-122). Encino, CA : Phillips Graduate Institute.
"In Search of a Lost Generation: Family Correspondence from Hungary 1936-1941," paper initially presented at Second Generation Network Second Generation Trust Conference. London, England.
"Reflections on Remembrance Day," "The Berkshire Eagle", April 20, 2001
"Tikkun Olam: A Second Generation Story" If Not Now, an e-Journal Volume 2, Winter 2001
"Falling Angels in New Jersey." Studio Art Magazine (Israel) (March 1991) : 54-5.
Baker searches for his family history in order to find his own identity.
Berger, a New York Times reporter, recounts what it was like being a child of Polish refugee survivors, and details the lives of his parents.
Sister, Sister, Hale & Iremonger, 1998
The story of two sisters whose lives span the marketplaces of pre-war Krakow, Poland, the horror of the Holocaust, the haven of Schindler's factory and the the apparent peace and safety of a suburban backyard in Melbourne, Australia
Fictional reflections of a haunted 2nd gen obituary writer emigree from Australia to New York.
52 weekly columns originally for Die Zeit, reflecting on New York City, family, culture and current events.
Things Could Be Worse (with David Rankin)
Collection of stories on evil, optimism and survival.
Ruth Rothwax returns to Poland with her father, to confront the past as well as her future.
What God Wants (with David Rankin)
Collection of interrelated stories, first published in Australia, brings together middle-class men and women who share a community and the same terrible childhood memory--their parents were all Holocaust survivors.
You Gotta Have Balls (with David Rankin)
Ruth Rothwax's survivor father gets her to loosen up.
After Picador, 1996
Draws on stories of his own family's survival of the death camps for this corrosive satirical novel of the Holocaust's aftermath
Nothing Makes You Free, Melvin Jules Bukiet, Editor. Norton, April 2002
Collection of fiction and non-fiction prose, by the descendants of survivors of the Holocaust. Contributors include Eva Hoffman, Thane Rosenbaum, Victoria Redel, Art Spiegelman, and Carl Friedman.
Signs and Wonders, Picador, 1999
On the eve of the millennium, in the midst of a brutal hurricane on the Baltic coast, a concrete prison barge rips free of its moorings, releasing 12 depraved souls and the one they call their Savior.
Sandman's Dust 1986
Stories of an Imaginary Childhood 1992
While the Messiah Tarries Hanrest Books, 1995.
Chronicling the lives of Jews in America, nine stories combining history, fable, theology, and myth include searching for an impossible gem in Manhattan's diamond district, a university library that catalogues human evil, and a rabbi matching wits with the devil.
Motherland: Beyond the Holocaust—A Mother-Daughter Journey to Reclaim the Past.
A Journey into Ourselves: Children of Holocaust Survivors Talk. Elisar Publication, 1986.
The son translates the father's wartime experiences from Polish to English
His father, brother and cousin's story.
Fiction based on the FBI's Office of Special Investigations' charge to expose Nazis illegally in the U.S.
Children of the Holocaust : Conversations With Sons and Daughters of Survivors, Penguin, 1988
Where She Came From, A Daughter's Search For Her Mother's History 1997
Epstein traces her maternal family history through several generations to its Central European roots, along the way exploring the effects of assimilation, national identity, and the Nazi Holocaust on Jews living in the Czech lands of Bohemia and Moravia.
Three fiction shorts exploring Holocaust themes. The title story concerns an elderly Polish Jew who takes in a greedy couple of borders. The second story, "Holy Fire" traces a Dutch Jewish teenager's transformation into a fanatical fundamentalist. In "Bette," a Dutch woman cares for her terminally ill mother.
Friedman is a Dutch poet and journalist who is a child of survivors and lives in Holland. The novel is about three siblings' struggle to understand their survivor father.
In this novel, Chaya, a Belgian philosophy student and child of survivors, discovers Jewish tradition and grapples with such issues as whether God exists, the irrational hatred of Jews over the centuries and whether the universe is a random, meaningless coincidence. Has been made into a film called "Left Luggage," starring Isabella Rosellini.
Lessons that can be learned from the Channukah story.
Everything Is Illuminated: A Novel
story of 3rd gen's search for the Ukrainian woman who hid his grandmother.
Children of the Shadows - Voices of the Second Generation; edited by Kathy Grinblat. Intl Specialized Book Service April 2001.
Explores the difficulties of preserving an authentic version of Holocaust events, how 2nd Gen should convey its knowledge to others, the effects of traumatic past on its inheritors and what are the second generation's responsibilities to its received memories.
Recounts her travels across Eastern Europe following the fall of communism.
This child of Polish survivors was born in Krakow and emigrated to Vancouver, British Columbia at the age of thirteen. Her memoir examines the effect of emigration during adolescence as well as loss of language and culture, and the various contexts in which she evolved her identity as a woman and daughter of survivors.
Fiction debut about cloning
Shtetl : The Life and Death of a Small Town and the World of Polish Jews
Memoir of life under Nazi occupation
Anne Karpf is the child of Polish survivors who grew up in London. She works as a freelance journalist.
Jew Boy: A Memoir Foxrock Books, 2001.
Alan Kaufman grew up struggling with his Jewish identity, vowing never to become a victim like his mother. He hitchhikes across the U.S. only to summon the phantoms he had sought to escape. His flight, after taking him to a kibbutz in Israel and the Israeli army, returns him to the streets of New York, homeless and an alcoholic, until at last he finds redemption in poetry. Review of Jew Boy from San Francisco Chronicle
Beat poetry.
The Heart Has Reasons: Holocaust Rescuers and Their Stories of Courage
Stories of Dutch rescuers.
Who Will Say Kaddish: A Search for Jewish Identity in Contemporary Poland (Religion, Theology, and the Holocaust) with photographer Gary Gelb
Through interviews, photography, reportage, and personal memoir, "Who Will Say Kaddish?" creates a sociolcultural portrait of the multilayered community of renewed Jewish life and tradition in Poland that has emerged since the fall of the Communist regime in 1989.
The Holocaust Kid: Stories, Persea Books, 2001
Autobiographical fiction in which Pilcer follows legacy as it courses through lust and desire, guilt and fear, and joy.
An exerpt can be found at "Gleanings" "The Forward," April 13, 2001
Little Darlings, Ballantine Books, 1983
I-Land : Manhattan in Monologue, Ballantine Books, 1987
Teen Angel, Avon, 1980
A cult classic.
Maiden Rites, Viking Press, 1982
Fictionalized autobiographical account of her family's survival in Krakow and their emigration to South America and finally to the United States.
First person account by the daughter of a survivor two stories running side by side, one in the written word and one in the pictures.
Dancing on Tisha B'av by Lev Raphael
Nineteen stories about children of survivors, anti-semitism, and homophobia. Winner of a 1990 Lambda Book Award.
An historical novel based on letters from the author's grandmother to his father(the grandmother was trapped in Germany, the father managed to get out to UK in March 1939.
Hiding Places : A Father and His Sons Retrace Their Family's Escape from the Holocaust Simon and Schuster, 2000
In the wake of his divorce, Daniel searches for something that will repair the damage done to his splintered family. He and the boys need to be connected to something larger than themselves; they need inoculation against evil. Daniel wants to reclaim their roots and plant them deep; to solve their dislocation so that they might all be, if not at peace, at least incontext. But ultimately, the trip is about finding out why he wants to take the trip, and as in all important journeys, this is achieved in ways the travelers could not have predicted.
A first collection from Rosenbaum, a Manhattan lawyer turned writer, draws heavily on the author's memories of growing up as the child of Holocaust survivors.
Comedy begins with suicide of parents, devastating the son but envigorating the grandaughter.
Son is so haunted by his parents' experience that he becomes a Nazi-hunter. He loses his job and family pursuing revenge, and discovers a hidden half-brother.
The Net of Dreams: A Family's Search for a Rightful Place (1997)
A reporter and film critic for the Wall Street Journal, The Net of Dreams is a memoir of her complex family history and her parents' survival in Nazi death camps.
Awake in My Sleep (lullabies), Sifriat Poalim, 2000 [Yashen Hu Er Bemakom Acher]
Children's poems about sleep and night with illustration by Israeli artist Avner Katz
Becoming Gershona (young adults), Am Oved, 1988 [Gershona-Shona]
Living in Tel Aviv in 1958, twelve-year-old Gershona is surrounded by an adult world filled with secrets she doesn't understand.
Bride on Paper (novel), Am Oved, 1996 [Isha Al Niyar]
Die Braut meines Bruders. ( Ab 12 J.) Publisher: Beltz; (March 1, 2003)
Flying Lessons (novel), Am Oved, 1990 / Moris Haviv®el melamed la-°uf
12-year-old Hadara dreams of flying. The shoemaker next door says he was once in a circus, and he encourages her to fly. It turns out he was not in a circus but in a concentration camp, where he fixed shoes for the Germans.
Flugstunden Publisher: Beltz; (September 1, 2000)
Hat of Glass (stories), Sifriat Poalim, 1985 [Kova Zechuchit]
A collection 10 stories the heroes of which are children of Holocaust survivers. The first Israeli book to focus on the children of Holocaust survivors (published 1985; new edition, 1998; translated into German and Italian; Soon to be published in the USA).
An Old Lady (play), Adam, 1987 [Ahat Zkenah]
Night Games (novel), Am Oved, 1994 [Ralli Masah Matarah]
Nighty Night (lullabies), Yediot Aharonot, 1998 [Liluna] (in Hebrew)
Poems of Pregnancy and Birth, Sifriat Poalim, 1983 [Shirei Herayon Ve-Leidah] (in Hebrew)
The Rat Laughs, Yediot, 1997, 44 pp, (in Hebrew)
Over 60 years later, a women tells her childhood story to her grandchildren
Tsehok shel °akhbarosh Publisher: Yedi°ot aòharonot; (2001)
Who Stole the Show (children), Yediot Aharonot, 1997 [Mi Ganav Et Ha-Hatzagah] (in Hebrew)
"Maus." MAUS is an illustrated narrative of Holocaust survivor Vladek Spiegelman, edited, formatted and illustrated by his son Art Spiegelman, a veteran of the underground comix movement of the 1960's and 70's, current cartoonist for New Yorker Magazine, and teacher at NYC's School of Visual Arts.
The Silence: How Tragedy Shapes Talk Waynryb interviews children of survivors and explores communication in survivor families. Explaining the effects of trauma on communication, this book offers an understanding of the language of silence that often becomes the first step to healing from a multitude of traumas.
Daughter of Absence edited by Mindy Weisel. Twelve 12 essays by daughters of survivors, many of whom are artists. Contributors include Helen Epstein, Aviva Kempner, Rosie Weisel, Eva Fogelman
Justice Matters: Legacies of the Holocaust and World War II
Examines the psychology of hatred and ethnic resentments passed from generation to generation, argues that while legal systems offer a structured means for redressing injustice, it often does not redress the emotional pain, which, left unresolved, is then passed along to the next generation-leading to entrenched ethnic tension and group conflict. Chronicles a study of children of survivors and Nazis, and finds that story-telling is central to keeping the cycle of ethnic and religious strife alive is, with each side recounting the injustice it suffered and the valor shown by avenging its own group. Now with a companion video and blog.
Doing Psychotherapy Effectively
Proposes answers to the question of what therapists actually do when they are effective, offers a mode of evaluation that focuses not on a particular school of therapy but on the relationship between therapist and patient.
Science-fiction/fantasy stories in Jewish family life settings.
Jewels and Ashes (A Harvest Book)
The Australian son of Polish Jews travels to Poland to discover his family history and better understand the present-day inner lives of those like him.
"In the Shadow of Memory" 52 min. Focuses on Jerri Zbiral, the daughter of a survivor of the Nazi destruction of the Catholic village of Lidice, Czechoslovakia. By Jacky Comforty, Alan Teller, Jerri Zbiral.
"The Optimists"82 min. How Christian and Muslim neighbors saved 50,000 Bulgarian Jews saved from the Holocaust. Directed by Jacky Comforty.
"More Precious Than Pearls" (50 min) A film about the father of the filmmaker, a pearl importer in New York's Jewelry District, and his memories of growing up in a small town in Slovakia, where his great grandfather was a Hassidic rebbe. After liberation from Ebensee, Alex Friedman was provided a haven in Northern Ireland which restored his faith in humankind. (USA, 2004, English)
"Emily And Gitta" 28 min. video about Emily, the child of Holocaust survivors, and Gitta, who grew up in Germany thinking of herself as innocent and not responsible for her parents' generation's actions during the war. Almost as soon as it begins, however, their relationship threatens to be torn apart by the histories and memories they do and do not share.
"Alois Brunner: The Last Nazi" tells the story of the most wanted Nazi war criminal believed to still be alive today and living in Syria. It reveals his crimes, how he escaped justice after WWII, who helped him and why. Interviews include Simon Wiesenthal, Serge Klarsfeld, Holocaust experts, survivors of Brunner's deportations, Brunner's neice and the last German journalist who interviewed Brunner in Damascus in the late 80's. Goldman is 2nd gen and Koplow is 3rd gen.
The Children of Chabannes 91 min. 1999. Story of how the people of Chabannes, a tiny village in unoccupied France, chose action over indifference and saved the lives of 400 Jewish refugee children. her father and uncle were two of the saved children.
"Pola's March" 65 min. (1998) documents grandmother's trip to Poland leading a March of the Living group.
"Children Of Legacy Home" one-hour video documentary that examines the aftereffects of the Holocaust on her Jewish American family.
"The Darien Dilemma" The filmmaker explores a war story with his father.
"Say I'm a Jew" a video about issues of identity for the European Children of Holocaust Survivors. Presented as part of the installation JEW, circulating throughout the country
"Choice and Destiny" The filmmaker's father, Yitshak (80 years old), and mother, Fruma (72), are Holocaust survivors living in Israel. This film portrays their lives in retirement burdened by the shadows of memory. Unlike Yitshak, who talks of his survival in the death camps, Fruma refuses to talk until, under the film's influence, she breaks 50 years of silence at the end to speak of her own family's humiliation. This moving story is told through the small gestures of the daily routine of the couple's lives preparing food and eating with their grandchildren.
Four of the founders of this magazine are children of holocaust survivors who got together to redefine for themselves what it means to be Jewish in the 90s
Photographer Michael Dubiner traveled to Poland to revisit his mother's birthplace and wrote an article along with approximately 40 pictures on his website.
A COS Artist
Conceptual artist particularly interested in creating installation media that deal with history and memory.
Artist Pier Marton works with desktop video and graphics, installation, performance and sound. His pieces revolve around issues of violence, ethnicity, and spirituality
Lena Fiszman - Journey to Poland with her parents.
Caroline Isakow - A Parent’s Personal Testimony.
Pauline Rockman - Book Launch of Anna Blay's book "Sister, Sister".
Dinitia Smith - For the Holocaust 'Second Generation' an Artistic Quest.
Dr. Jack Felman - Growing up as a child of Holocaust Survivors
Stan Marks - The Holocaust and the 21st Century
Tom Beer - Film Review of "The Last Days"
Rita Glassman, a cantor from Brooklyn who is the fourth and youngest child of two Holocaust survivors.
Dana and Karen Kletter are identical twin sisters, daughters of Hungarian Jewish survivors.
Memphis TN choir staffed exlusively with third-gen singers.
"Being the child of a Holocaust survivor pervades every facet of my life. Especially my music." This intense, mystical songwriter, guitarist, singer captivates audiences with his focused delivery of stripped-down guitar based melodic alternative rock.
2000 - Triton Museum of Art, Santa Clara, CA -- Bittersweet Legacy -- Creative Responses to the Holocaust -- installation, mixed media and acrylic paintings
1999 - Second Generation/The Holocaust Through the Eyes of the Artist - The Los Angeles Museum of the Holocaust, Los Angeles, CA
Soul Reflections - The Journey: A Survivor's Child Speaks (book)
Born in post-war Germany, Jaskierowics Arman came to the US in 1962 and became a vocal performer and teacher. She is also a visual artist and poet. About this book, she writes: "Come with me on a voyage into the vast abyss of the human soul and witness the transformation of my feelings into color, form and verbal images. The exteriors are stripped away and only the essence remains." For more about the author, see the soulreflections website. Nominted for the 2004 Pulitzer.
Here, the poems are presented by the author and accompanied by original compositions for cello by Mme. Johanne Perron.
Publication of the English organization "The Association of Children of Jewish Refugees." Wire-bound 90-page book of poems by organization members. To order a copy email: info@acjr.org.uk.
Bittersweet Legacy-Creative Responses to the Holocaust, University Press of America, 2001
A collection of poetry, short stories and art inspired by the Holocaust. (According to author, 15% discount if ordered through http://www.coshresources.org/www.univpress.com)
Who Are We? Wordland Books/Davka Limited Editions, 1998.
Also the author of an autobiographical account of his attempts to escape his mother's experiences. Listed above in "books.") Other poetry titles include American Cruiser, The New Generation and Before I Wake. Anthologies to which he has contributed includes ALOUD: Voices From The Nuyorican Poets Cafe (Henry Holt), Identity Lessons: Learning American Style (Penguin Books, Nov.98), Witness, Tikkun and Long Shot.
Other People's Troubles, University of Chicago Press, September 1997
"Jason Sommer writes of troubles that unfold at the intersection of history made and personality in making, of self and other, of wakefulness and sleep." Winner of a Society of Midland Author’s Prize, finalist for the Pen USA West literary Prize for poetry.
Lifting the Stone: Poems, Dufour Editions; 1991.
The Man Who Sleeps in My Office (Phoenix Poets Series) University of Chicago Press (April 20, 2004)
A Delicate Balance For Simcha Shirman the experience of growing up in Israel and being parented by Holocaust survivors created a sense of loss and fragmentation. He uses the metaphor of the one-armed rider to communicate what it feels like to be haunted by a phantom memory.
Studies/Presentations on Children of Holocaust Survivors
R. M. Chandler-Burns led a discussion which included therapists' experiences with COS patients.
Using the "literary practice" and the "literary event" as units of analysis, this dissertation explores the community literary practices and cultural transmission by examining a range of shifts in the uses and meanings of Yisker Bikher as reported by two generations of readers and writings. As practices, reading and writing were defined in terms of multiple activities and settings, involving a variety of genres, uses, functions, and meanings. The study looks at how, when, where, why, by whom, and for whom community literary is done, in addition to the forms and features of community literacy.
"Find Me A Voice" explores the spiritual consequences of the Holocaust through the use of poetry, music, monologues and dramatic scenes. First performed by the New Jersey Repertory Company.
Daughter of survivors Deb Filler, is performing her one-woman show "Filler UP."
"Camp Holocaust" is a comedy about two contemporary Jews who build a mock concentration camp in Poland to deal with their issues as children of survivors.
"Finding my Mother's Voice" - the true story of discovering the untold stories of my cabaret star mother, actress Chayela Rosenthal, wunderkind of the Vilna Ghetto, ran to sold out houses off Broadway in July, followed by special keynote presentation in September at the 2004 International Child Survivor Conference in Denver. Upcoming performances in 2005 include Boynton Beach JCC in February, Cleveland - April 3, and New York - April 4 & 5 at the Folksbiene Yiddish Theatre at the upper west side JCC.
Monodrama "The Child Behind the Eyes," produced on stage in Israel (1986), Rome (1990), New York (1991), Los Angeles (1996) and Prague (1997). As a radio-drama, it was produced by the BBC London, Radio France, Radio Belgium, Radio Spain, Radio Ireland, six radio stations in Germany, Radio Austria, and Radio Rumania.
"Hunger" (radio-drama) produced by the German Radio WDR in 1988
L'Chaim: a Holocaust Web Project, at the University of Baltimore.
The Ernest and Elisabeth Cassutto Memorial Page: Survivors of the Holocaust
The March of the Living. at Marianapolis College
Poetry, Essays, & Short Stories by Children of Survivors and Our Parents
The Shoah Dream Project, a record of dreams with Holocaust themes, including some entries from second gen people
