I Was a Doctor in Auschwitz (Bloomsbury Studies in Jewish Literature) - Softcover

Perl

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1498583946 ISBN 13: 9781498583947

Publisher: Lexington, 2019

Synopsis

Gisella Perl’s memoir is the extraordinarily candid account of women’s extreme efforts to survive Auschwitz. With writing as powerful as that of Charlotte Delbo and Ruth Kluger, her story individualizes and therefore humanizes a victim of mass dehumanization. Perl accomplished this by representing her life before imprisonment, in Auschwitz and other camps, and in the struggle to remake her life. It is also the first memoir by a woman Holocaust survivor and establishes the model for understanding the gendered Nazi policies and practices targeting Jewish women as racially poisonous. Perl’s memoir is also significant for its inclusion of the Nazis’ Roma victims as well as in-depth representations of Nazi women guards and other personnel. Unlike many important Holocaust memoirs, Perl’s writing is both graphic in its horrific detail and eloquent in its emotional responses. One of the memoir’s major historical contributions is Perl’s account of being forced to work alongside Dr. Josef Mengele in his infamous so-called clinic and using her position to save the lives of other women prisoners. These efforts including infanticide and abortion, topics that would remain silenced for decades and, unfortunately, continue to be marginalized from all too many Holocaust accounts. After decades out of print, this new edition will ensure the crucial place of Perl’s testimony on Holocaust memory and education.

About this title

About the Authors

Eva Hoffman is the author of Lost in Translation: A Life In A New Language, Shtetl, and The Secret. Her essays and journalism have appeared in The New York Times, The Atlantic, The Yale Review, and other publications.

Phyllis Lassner is Professor Emerita in the Crown Center for Jewish and Israel Studies, Gender Studies, and Writing Programs at Northwestern University, USA. She is author of numerous books and articles on Holocaust literature and representation including as co-editor of the Palgrave Handbook of Holocaust Literature and Culture (2020).

Edition details

• Publisher: Lexington
• Publication date: 2019
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1498583946
• ISBN 13: 9781498583947
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 140