Skip to main content

Book Review: Edith’s Story by Edith Van Hessen

Edith Van Hessen was born in 1925, in a prosperous Dutch Jewish family. Edith’s story is a non-fiction book and the narrative springs up from the dairy which she used to maintain during her teenage years and letters she wrote and received during the wartime when Nazis were clamping hard on the Jews of Holland.


In 1939, she was a popular, 14-year-old, high-school student. Then her life was perfect – sporting events, trips with friends, crush on boys, etc. However when the Hitler-led Nazis invaded Holland, she could not apprehend the future would be dented. For this reason, she is somewhat considered stupid as she could not see the approaching danger for herself and her family. Nazis didn’t round up the Jews of Holland all at once, it was done in a process, step by step, they were expelled from schools, stopped to meet non-Jewish people, and later on were made to transport, on plausible excuses, to concentration camps. 

Though her father had excellent connections in the USA, to escape, but the family persisted to stay as the grandma was from Germany, but she was stripped of the citizenship being a Jew. There were many people who could take care of the ageing grandmother if they were to leave for the USA. Unfortunately, they missed the chance and the ramifications were staring straight in their faces. Also the older people in the family failed to tend their health. The father died alone in the hospital, with no family member around him. Edith had two elder brothers as well. The eldest one, Gus, moved away and joined the US army. Second brother joined the underground movement but could not survive the wrath of Nazi camps.  

Right under the nose of Nazis, Edith escaped to join a protestant family and worked as a maid at their home in the guise of gentile. She remained hidden for three years and it was heartbreaking that she heard news of her family members’ death, one by one. After the war was over, she was reunited with Gus. Out of six family members, only two survived the war. Edith sounded so spoony during the pre-war time but as the time changed she immediately had to grow up to turn out to be an extraordinary girl of courage and optimism. As Edith shares every harrowing account with the readers, it is a sad and heartbreaking tale of a family that was caught in the Holocaust crossfire like millions other. 

The story, like many other books in the holocaust literature, isn’t about loss and death but also about humanity and courage and it is going to stick with readers forever.
Labels:
Location: New Delhi, India

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Book Review: The Blue Umbrella by Ruskin Bond

Among all Ruskin Bond books, The Blue Umbrella has, so far, gathered immense applaud from readers and critics alike.  This is a short novel, but the kind of moral lessons it teaches to us are simply overwhelming. This is a story of Binya, a poor little girl living with her mother and an elder brother, Bijju, in a small hilly village of Garhwal. One day while herding her two cows back home, she stumbles upon some city people enjoying the picnic in the valley. She is enthralled to see them well-groomed and rich. She craves to be one like them and among many other things of their, a blue frilly umbrella catches her attention. She begins craving for it. On the other hand, the city people get attracted by her innocent beauty and the pendant in her neck. The pendant consists of leopard’s claw – which is considered a mascot widely in the hills. Binya trades her pendant off with the blue umbrella. The blue umbrella is so much beautiful that soon it becomes a topic of conversatio...
65 comments
Read more

Poem Summary: Where The Mind Is Without Fear by Rabindranath Tagore

Poem by Rabindranath Tagore: Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high Where knowledge is free Where the world has not been broken up into fragments By narrow domestic walls Where words come out from the depth of truth Where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection Where the clear stream of reason has not lost its way Into the dreary desert sand of dead habit Where the mind is led forward by thee Into ever-widening thought and action Into that heaven of freedom, my Father, let my country awake. Short Summary: This poem is written by Rabindranath Tagore during pre-independence days, when India was a colony of the British. The underlying theme of the poem is absolute freedom; the poet wants the citizens of his country to be living in a free state. According to the poem, we see that the poet is expressing his views there should be a country, like where people live without any sort of fear and with pure dignity…they should ...
68 comments
Read more

Character Sketch of Binya from ‘The Blue Umbrella’ by Ruskin Bond

The Blue Umbrella by Ruskin Bond is a popular children’s story. It features Binya as the main character, though there are other important characters as well, but the story revolves around Binya and her little beautiful umbrella. The story is widely popular among children, thus it has also been included in the schools’ syllabus all across the country. Since it is often taught in the school, thus the character sketch of Binya is often demanded by students from year to year. Character Sketch of Binya from The Blue Umbrella by Ruskin Bond Binya is the main character of the novel ‘The Blue Umbrella’ by Ruskin Bond. Her full name is Binyadevi. As in the hills or anywhere in India it is a kind of trend to call children with their short nicknames. Binya’s elder brother’s name is Bijju, whereas his real name is Vijay. Binya aged eleven is a hilly girl. She lives with her small family in the hills of Garhwal. Her father died when she was two years of age. For sustenance, the...
41 comments
Read more