No Common Place : The Holocaust Testimony of Alina Bacall-Zwirn

by Bacall-Zwirn, Alina; Stark, Jared

• ISBN13: 9780803261785
• ISBN10: 0803261780
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2000-08-01
• Publisher: Univ of Nebraska Pr

Summary

"You know, a lot of people like to talk about it, and I'm always pushing, pushing away, you know, I'm always pushing. I hate to remember, I hate to talk about it." But in the wake of her husband's death, and afraid that the story would never be told, Alina Bacall-Zwirn, a survivor of the Warsaw ghetto and four Nazi concentration camps, decided to remember and to bear witness to the history she and her husband suffered together. In a unique format that combines personal testimony, photographs, letters, legal documents and contributions from Alina's family;No Common Placeinterweaves a survivor's story with her reflections on the impact of her traumatic past on herself and her family. As it follows Alina through conversations with Jared Stark and with interviewers at the Fortunoff Video Archive for Holocaust Testimonies, and as it records her participation in the dedication ceremonies of the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, the books speaks to the importance of the individual's voice in shaping collective memory of the Holocaust. The supporting materials--chronology, maps, and notes--allow the survivor's voice to serve as a guide to the study of the Holocaust and its aftermath.

Author Biography

Alina Bacall-Zwirn was born Alinka Handszer in Warsaw, Poland, in 1922. Married in the Warsaw ghetto and a survivor of four Nazi concentration camps, she immigrated to the United States with her husband in 1949. Alina died in 1997, one month after completing her testimony.



Jared Stark is Assistant Professor of Literary Cultures at the John W. Draper Interdisciplinary Master's Program in Humanities and Social Thought at New York University.

Table of Contents

Preface	ix
Acknowledgments and Sources	xiii
Family Tree	xv
Chronology	xvii
Note on the Text	xxiii
Map	xxi
I start preparing	1	(5)
Until there is company	6	(7)
Who will remember	13	(3)
I remember not too much	16	(9)
To the end, it's a different story	25	(4)
A small opening	29	(5)
Safe and not safe	34	(6)
The next half of my life	40	(4)
Majdanek	44	(6)
Auschwitz-Birkenau	50	(7)
A connection	57	(4)
Selection	61	(3)
Only me	64	(5)
On the oven	69	(4)
I still hear the cry	73	(5)
Meeting Ruth	78	(8)
Onions and coffee	86	(7)
And I think we got stronger	93	(3)
Liberation	96	(5)
And we miss each other	101	(6)
From Marburg to America	107	(8)
Memorials	115