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Synopsis
In 1940, while the Germans occupied Holland, fourteen-year-old Edith van Hessen was filling her diary with the intimate, carefree details of a typical teenager's life — thoughts about boys, school, her family, her friends, her future. By 1942, as Edith was contemplating her first kiss, the Germans had begun to escalate their war against the Jews. Soon this bright, fun-loving girl was grappling with one of the most unfathomable events in human history. Edith's family — assimilated Dutch Jews — were caught in the cross fire of the Holocaust, and Edith began a bitter struggle to survive.
In this extraordinary work, Edith Velmans weaves together revealing entries from her diaries with reminiscences and letters smuggled between family members during the occupation. Edith's Story stands as a profoundly important addition to the literature of the Holocaust, documenting one girl's grief, loss, courage, and ultimate triumph over devastating tyranny and despair. For as Edith is hidden in plain sight by a Christian family, we witness how a young woman must deny, bargain with, and finally face the horrors of war — and how, confronting evil as a child, Edith survives to become an extraordinary woman.
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From the Back Cover
"I never realized that there could be such suffering in the world, and that anyone could live through it."
-- Excerpt from Edith's diary, July 1, 1945
"Truly moving...leaving one with great hope in humanity."
-- The Times (London)
"Edith's Story, the memoir of an Anne Frank who lived, reminds us of the old horror all the more effectively by not being a horror story. Evil and grief, without being scanted, are outshone by sweetness, freshness, and pluck."
-- Roy Blount Jr.
International praise for Edith's Story:
"The most vivid evocation of the experience of Nazi Occupation I have ever read."
-- The Independent (London)
"It's impossible to get through this inspiring and great-hearted volume dry-eyed, or without admiration for people who so bravely persevere through unimaginable hardship and privation."
-- The Washington Post
"Velmans' candid portrayal of herself as a feisty, loving, sometimes self-absorbed teenager is thoroughly engaging and her story throws a new light on the plight of Jews who survived the war hidden in plain sight."
-- Publishers Weekly
"Edith's Story gives all the pain and pleasure of reading Anne Frank for the first time."
-- Esther Freud
"A significant Holocaust memoir... A valuable opportunity to see the situation just outside Anne's attic."
-- Kirkus Reviews
"A quiet, gripping narrative with the writer's hindsight and restrained commentary."
-- ALA Booklist (starred review)
"One of the best and most moving memoirs I have ever read."
-- Ruth Rendell
"The miracle of this story is not that Edith survived, but that she survived with her love of life intact."
-- The Roanoke Times
About the Author
After the war, Edith Velmans became a psychologist and eventually settled in the United States. In 1996, she was knighted by Queen Beatrix of the Netherlands. She and her husband now live in Sheffield, Massachusetts.
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- PublisherPenguin Books
- Publication date1999
- ISBN 10 0140276890
- ISBN 13 9780140276893
- BindingPaperback
- Number of pages276
- Rating
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Edith's Book
Published by
Penguin Books Ltd, United Kingdom, London, 1999
ISBN 10: 0140276890
ISBN 13: 9780140276893
Used
Paperback
Seller: WorldofBooks, Goring-By-Sea, WS, United Kingdom
Seller rating 5 out of 5 stars
Paperback. Condition: Very Good. Winner of the Jewish Quarterly-Wingate Literary Prize for Non-fiction Edith's Book (published as Edith's Story in the US) is often compared to Anne Frank's diary. In occupied Holland, Edith, from a lively, loving Jewish family in The Hague, went into hiding the same month as Anne Frank, both Edith and Anne kept diaries, which are remarkably similar in their pre-war teen preoccupations with boys, school and parties. But Edith's world gradually darkens. When Nazi laws forbid her from attending school, riding her bike or even going to the beach, she wears the yellow star as a badge of honour, prompting people in the street to tell her to keep her chin up. In 1943, she is forced into hiding with forged papers, posing as a family friend in a courageous gentile household in the south of Holland, where a Nazi officer is billeted in the room next to hers. Under constant danger of discovery and betrayal, she receives terrible news from home in dribs and drabs-the deportation to the death camps first of her brother, then her mother and grandmother, never to be heard from again, while her father dies broken-hearted in a far-off hospital. Edith can only dare shout her real name to the wind, and wait for liberation. Unlike Anne Frank, Edith survived to tell her tale, and her moving teenage diary is enhanced by heartbreaking letters from her parents. A poignant coda is that after the war she became friends in the maternity ward with Miep Gies, who had helped to hide the Franks. The book has been read, but is in excellent condition. Pages are intact and not marred by notes or highlighting. The spine remains undamaged. Seller Inventory # GOR004269912
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Edith's Book: The True Story of How One Young Girl Survived the War
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Softcover. Condition: Bon. Légères traces d'usure sur la couverture. Ammareal reverse jusqu'à 15% du prix net de ce livre à des organisations caritatives. ENGLISH DESCRIPTION Book Condition: Used, Good. Slight signs of wear on the cover. Ammareal gives back up to 15% of this book's net price to charity organizations. Seller Inventory # C-726-864
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Edith's book / Edith Velmans
Published by
London: Penguin, 1999
ISBN 10: 0140276890
ISBN 13: 9780140276893
Used
Softcover
First Edition
Seller: MW Books, New York, NY, U.S.A.
Seller rating 5 out of 5 stars
1st edition. Fine paperback copy. Particularly and surprisingly well-preserved; tight, bright, clean and especially sharp-cornered. Physical description: xiii, 240 p., [16] p. of plates: ill., map, ports.; 20 cm. Subjects: Velmans-Van Hessen, Edith (1925-). Velman, Edith. Holocaust, Jewish (1939-1945); Personal narratives. World War, 1939-1945 Jews Netherlands Hague. Holocaust, Jewish (1939-1945) Netherlands Hague Personal narratives. Genre: Autobiography. 1 Kg. Seller Inventory # 313040
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