As described by Borowski in The People Who Walked, prisoners in the Auschwitz concentration camp during WWII survived by employing physical and mental strategies that helped them maintain a semblance of hope, despite their deplorable living conditions.
First, prisoners in the Auschwitz camp practiced a variety of physical methods to attempt to draw parallels to their lives prior to their internment, while trying to hold on to their sanity. One of these was the building of a soccer field in an open space of land, in which games were conducted during free time. According to Borowski, prisoners made a garden complete with flowers, vegetables, and brick design. Some plants included sunflowers, spinach and garlic. Additionally, prisoners opened
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Borowski states that “Probably they too had their lovers, and probably they too stole margarine and tins of food in order to pay for blankets and dresses” as a way of meeting sexual and human desires (248). There was the girl, Mirka, who decorated her barrack in all things pink and had a Jew from a different Kommando that despite eminent danger from chiefs or S.S. officers patrolling the women’s barracks threw her eggs over the barbed wire fence. He also came and spent time with her, despite the potential consequences it could lead to. Jewish women in the camps also begged the prisoners working in the camps for anything and everything they could give them. It ranged from “a penknife, a handkerchief, a spoon, a pencil, a piece of paper, a shoe string, or bread” (248). Jewish women also wore brightly colored dresses and had “colorful quilts and blankets” they hid sick people under, such as the “pretty child”; as a result, this camp was known as the “Persian Market” (247). According to Borowski, interned people also used the latrines as a forum for “love dialogue,” as nothing was “uncomfortable” due to the atrocity of the camp (253). Elders of the camps tried to keep Jews distracted from their thoughts by encouraging that singers sang, dancers danced, and poets recited (251). Elders also allowed Jews to drink tea or take naps in …show more content…
First, prisoners viewed the “Zauna” as a deplorable living condition because it was part of a concentration camp, but it at least presented a chance for Jews to live rather than immediate die in the gas chamber (245). Additionally, Jewish women tried to ease their mental suffering by asking prisoners about the status of their other family members, such as husbands and children, with questions such as “Surely they’re not dead?” or even more hopeful, “Tell us, are they at least a little better off?” (248). It was as though, if they could know that their families were ‘okay,’ their emotional suffering might be assuaged, even if only in the smallest sense. Borowski describes that “Despite their rough manner, they [Jewish women] had retained their femininity and human kindness”
There are unexpected aspects of life in the camp depicted in “This Way for the Gas, Ladies and Gentlement” by Tadeusz Borowski. The prisoners were able to make very obvious improvements to their lived in the camp, without reaction by the SS officers; the market was even made with the support of the camp. The prisoners actually hoped for a transport of prisoners, so as to gain some supplies. The true nature of the camp is never forgotten, even in better moments at the camp.
It is almost unimaginable the difficulties victims of the holocaust faced in concentration camps. For starters they were abducted from their homes and shipped to concentration camps in tightly packed cattle cars. Once they made it to a camp, a selection process occurred. The males were separated from the females. Then those who were too young or too old to work were sent to the showers. Once the showers were tightly packed, the Nazi’s would turn on the water and drop in canisters of chemicals that would react with the water and release a deadly gas. Within minutes, everyone in the shower would be dead. The bodies would be hauled out and burned. Those who were not selected to die didn’t fair much better. Terrible living conditions, forced labor, malnourishment, and physical abuse were just a few of the things they had to endure. It was such a dark time. So many invaluable lessons can be learned from the holocaust and from those who survived it. One theme present in Elie Wiesel’s novel Night and Robert Benigni’s film Life is Beautiful is that family can strengthen or hinder one during adversity.
Life in Auschwitz was definitely not what many people think it was. Life was hard, housing was rough, the guards were mean and brutal and the different things that could happen to you were terrifying. One day in there would have killed most people and they lived like that for years. Every day was a constant battle for their lives and they never got a break. So many people died from getting sick or from the things the guards would do and no one could save them. The food was bad and they had to hurt each other to get more food so that they wouldn’t starve. They were forced to turn against each other to survive when they never should have had to. Life was never the same for those who went to Auschwitz and survived. As for those who didn’t survive; they never saw a better day.
The short story, “The Shawl,” written by Cynthia Ozick, recounts World War II by providing a very vivid image of a Concentration Camp in Nazi Germany. As one reads, he or she can see that Ozick does a wonderful job in portraying the hard times of Jews during the Holocaust. In the first paragraph, we meet the central characters, Rosa, Stella, and Magda as they attempt to endure the fears of life in the Nazi Concentration Camp. Rosa and Stella, her niece, are marching in a line to the camp with Rosa’s daughter, Magda, wrapped and hidden in a shawl from the German soldiers. Unfortunately, at the end, Stella takes Magda’s shawl, and German soldiers kill Magda by throwing her into an electric fence. Throughout the story, Cynthia Ozick has used symbolism like life, protection, and death to make the readers understand the thoughts and feelings of each character which makes the climax really important and meaningful.
When in America, Helen found that it was hard not to talk about past and the stories of her imprisonment. “Some survivors found it impossible to talk about their pasts. By staying silent, they hoped to bury the horrible nightmares of the last few years. They wanted to spare their children and those who knew little about the holocaust from listening to their terrible stories.” In the efforts to save people from having to hear about the gruesome past, the survivors also lacked the resources to mentally recovery from the tragedy.
Primo Levi, in his novel Survival in Auschwitz (2008), illustrates the atrocities inflicted upon the prisoners of the concentration camp by the Schutzstaffel, through dehumanization. Levi describes “the denial of humanness” constantly forced upon the prisoners through similes, metaphors, and imagery of animalistic and mechanistic dehumanization (“Dehumanization”). He makes his readers aware of the cruel reality in the concentration camp in order to help them examine the psychological effects dehumanization has not only on those dehumanized, but also on those who dehumanize. He establishes an earnest and reflective tone with his audience yearning to grasp the reality of genocide.
The inmates usually lived in overcrowded barracks and slept in bunk “beds”. In the forced labour camps, for instance, the inmates usually worked 12 hours a day with hard physical work, clothed in rags, eating too little and always living under the risk of corporal punishment” (Holocaust | Concentration Camps). Only 7,000 emaciated survivors of a Nazi extermination process that killed an estimated six million Jews were found at Auschwitz” (Rice, Earle). Most of these deaths occurred towards the end of the war; however, there were still a lot of lives that had been miraculously spared. “According to SS reports, there were more than 700,000 prisoners left in the camps in January 1945.
In “ The Diary of Anne Frank” by Francis Goodrich and Albert Hackett, the author states, “It seems strange to say that anyone could be happy at a concentration camp,
Tadeusz Borrowski’s “This Way to the Gas, Ladies and Gentlemen” offers a dark and detailed perception into the environment and setting of the Auschwitz concentration camp. The camp is portrayed as a place of dehumanization where any sense of goodness, and honor are suppressed by each man and woman’s will and desire to survive. Dehumanization is making one seem less than human and hence not worthy of humane treatment. The most intense moment of
Imagine yourself in a WWⅡconcentration camp, performing forced labor in hideous living conditions whilst being nearly starved to death. What would be your attitude towards those around you, and most especially, your captors? For Corrie ten Boom and her sister Betsie, it was that of complete love and concern, and a desire to give them the light of Christ. A true story, The Hiding Place is Corrie ten Boom’s historical account of her and her family’s experience in WWⅡ. Written by Corrie herself, this 216 page book is crammed with tragedy as well as joy. Youngest of four children, Corrie ten Boom uses her home in Haarlem, Holland as a temporary safe house for Jews in hiding, until she is discovered and sent to prison as well as various concentration
The Holocaust continues to exist as a black mark in the history of Germany; through the government supported torture and extermination of both men and women, more than 6 million lost their lives. As a consequence of the collective tragedy for both sexes, there has been much debate pertaining to the focus of gender specific suffering in Holocaust literature; for this reason, the Holocaust accounts of women writers were largely ignored prior to the 1970’s. Many historians still refute disparities existed between the male and female experience. However, it is worth noting that the social, familial, and cultural expectations of men and women, both prior to and during the war, varied greatly. Moreover, these diverging roles promoted distinctively different coping, processing, and accounting of the tragedies stemming from the Holocaust. By examining the unique experiences of women, both within and outside the concentration camps, one can logically conclude these remarkable accounts broaden the scope of Holocaust literature. Embedded gender roles helped the survival efforts of women, and these unique female perspectives are valuable in accurately portraying the Holocaust experience.
The Holocaust is a devastating event that affects “all Jews, without exception” and defies the normal gender separations (Levi 14). Men and women alike, along with children, file into the concentration camps together because “misfortune ha[s] struck [them] together” (Levi 19). Almost always, families are split up and men are forced to leave their wives and their children when “the night swallow[s] them up” and they begin their journey under Nazi rule, while “[their] women, parents, [and] children disappear” (Levi 20). The experience of the Holocaust differs between men and women due to their biological makeup, but the women are not spared in any way. Women are not able to endure such brutal conditions as well as the men can and are much more vulnerable, causing their bodies and their mental states to deteriorate faster. Upon entering the concentration camps, “mothers [do] not want to be separated from their children” because their role in society outside of the concentration camps is to care for their children; and, their maternal instincts cause the women to feel a harsh pain and a longing for their children and families (Levi 19). The Jewish people even start to think that the Nazis are treating the Holocaust as “a game to mock and sneer” at them while they watch them suffer and cope with the brutalities and the separation of their families (Levi 24). The Holocaust robs the Jewish people of all of their independence, humanity, and sense of self-worth during the holocaust and they will “carry the tattoo on [their] left arm until [they] die” (Levi 27). The Nazis “transform [the Jews] into slaves”, causing them to “reach the bottom”, and they begin their “demolition” of a human being, which causes any distinguishing factor
"A Teacher's Guide to the Holocaust-Victims." A Teacher's Guide to the Holocaust-Victims. University of South Florida. Web. 19 May 2014.
Thousands of people were sent to concentration camps during World War Two, including Primo Levi and Elie Wiesel. Many who were sent to the concentration camps did not survive but those who did tried to either forgot the horrific events that took place or went on to tell their personal experiences to the rest of the world. Elie Wiesel and Primo Levi wrote memoirs on their time spent in the camps of Auschwitz; these memoirs are called ‘Night’ and ‘Survival in Auschwitz’. These memoirs contain similarities of what it was like for a Jew to be in a concentration camp but also portray differences in how each endured the daily atrocities of that around them. Similarities between Elie Wiesel and Primo Levi’s memoirs can be seen in the proceedings that
If This Is a Man or Survival in Auschwitz), stops to exist; the meanings and applications of words such as “good,” “evil,” “just,” and “unjust” begin to merge and the differences between these opposites turn vague. Continued existence in Auschwitz demanded abolition of one’s self-respect and human dignity. Vulnerability to unending dehumanization certainly directs one to be dehumanized, thrusting one to resort to mental, physical, and social adaptation to be able to preserve one’s life and personality. It is in this adaptation that the line distinguishing right and wrong starts to deform. Primo Levi, a survivor, gives account of his incarceration in the Monowitz- Buna concentration camp.