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Jewish Quarterly #258
The Rudashevski Diary: Jewish Quarterly 258
Yitskhok Rudashevski was taken to the Vilna Ghetto at age 13 and murdered at age 15. This is his diary, discovered in his final hiding place.
'Today I turned fifteen and live very much for tomorrow. I do not feel two ways about it. I see before me sun and sun and sun . . . '
Yitskhok Rudashevski was transferred to the Vilna Ghetto when he was thirteen. For nearly two years he used a small notebook to chronicle his hope, his despair and his experience of daily ghetto life. His diary was later discovered in an attic that was the final hiding place for him and his parents.
This remarkable translation from Yiddish by Solon Beinfeld reveals a teenager whose love of culture, history and knowledge defied the cruelty that surrounded him. Displaying empathy and intellect far beyond his years, Yitskhok confronts the terrible moral choices required for survival in the ghetto.
His diary, expertly introduced by Professor Samuel D. Kassow, is both a crucial historical document and a deeply poignant portrait of one lost soul among millions.
'Today I turned fifteen and live very much for tomorrow. I do not feel two ways about it. I see before me sun and sun and sun . . . '
Yitskhok Rudashevski was transferred to the Vilna Ghetto when he was thirteen. For nearly two years he used a small notebook to chronicle his hope, his despair and his experience of daily ghetto life. His diary was later discovered in an attic that was the final hiding place for him and his parents.
This remarkable translation from Yiddish by Solon Beinfeld reveals a teenager whose love of culture, history and knowledge defied the cruelty that surrounded him. Displaying empathy and intellect far beyond his years, Yitskhok confronts the terrible moral choices required for survival in the ghetto.
His diary, expertly introduced by Professor Samuel D. Kassow, is both a crucial historical document and a deeply poignant portrait of one lost soul among millions.
- GenresHistory
123 pages, Kindle Edition
Published November 7, 2024
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
September 18, 2025
3.5 wish they added what happened to them at the end
April 18, 2026
Holocaust Memorial Day (HMD) is commemorated each year on the 27th January, because that is the day of the liberation of the Nazi extermination and concentration camp at Auschwitz-Birkenau in 1945. As it says on the HMD website:
*This introduction is taken from the HMD website, but I have edited it to make clear that the Holocaust refers specifically to the murder of six million Jews.This year's theme is 'Bridging Generations':
Each year I commemorate this day by reading Jewish testimony from the Holocaust, but the testimony of Yitskhok Rudashevski — like the powerful testimony about life in hiding of Anne Frank (1929-1945) — is also from a teenager who did not survive. Yitskhok Rudashevski was thirteen years old when he was transferred to the Vilna Ghetto in Lithuania, and he kept a diary. This is from the back cover of this Jewish Quarterly edition:
The first part of the diary reads more like a memoir, as if Yitskhok has realised the importance of bearing witness. Although he writes with the immediacy of the present tense, he makes occasional comments that show that he is looking back at the very recent past from the present day. For example, in the diary entry dated October 1941, when writing about the search for firewood in the first days of the ghetto, he records that:
I think it was Tolstoy who said that in war, the commanders plotting strategy don't know what's really happening on the ground, and those on the battlefield can't see the big picture or its strategic importance, only their own part in it, so both disparage the other. This is true of Yitskhok's perspective.
To read the rest of my review please read https://anzlitlovers.com/2026/01/27/t...
Holocaust Memorial Day is the day for everyone to remember themillions of people[LH edit*: six million Jews] murdered in the Holocaust, under Nazi Persecution, and [LH edit: the people killed] in the genocides which followed in Cambodia, Rwanda, Bosnia, and Darfur.
*This introduction is taken from the HMD website, but I have edited it to make clear that the Holocaust refers specifically to the murder of six million Jews.This year's theme is 'Bridging Generations':
The theme for Holocaust Memorial Day (HMD) 2026, 'Bridging Generations', is a call-to-action. A reminder that the responsibility of remembrance doesn't end with the survivors - it lives on through their children, their grandchildren and through all of us. This theme encourages us all to engage actively with the past - to listen, to learn and to carry those lessons forward. By doing so, we build a bridge between memory and action, between history and hope for the future. [LH: underlining mine].
Each year I commemorate this day by reading Jewish testimony from the Holocaust, but the testimony of Yitskhok Rudashevski — like the powerful testimony about life in hiding of Anne Frank (1929-1945) — is also from a teenager who did not survive. Yitskhok Rudashevski was thirteen years old when he was transferred to the Vilna Ghetto in Lithuania, and he kept a diary. This is from the back cover of this Jewish Quarterly edition:
'Today I turned fifteen and live very much for tomorrow. I do not feel two ways about it. I see before me sun and sun and sun...'
For nearly two years he used a small notebook to chronicle his hope, his despair and his experience of daily ghetto life. His diary was later discovered in an attic that was the final hiding place for him and his parents.This remarkable translation from Yiddish by Solon Beinfeld reveals a teenager whose love of culture, history and knowledge defied the cruelty that surrounded him. Displaying empathy and intellect far beyond his years, Yitskhok confronts the terrible moral choices required for survival in the ghetto.
His diary, expertly introduced by Samuel D Kassow, is both a crucial historical document and a deeply poignant portrait of one lost soul among millions.
The first part of the diary reads more like a memoir, as if Yitskhok has realised the importance of bearing witness. Although he writes with the immediacy of the present tense, he makes occasional comments that show that he is looking back at the very recent past from the present day. For example, in the diary entry dated October 1941, when writing about the search for firewood in the first days of the ghetto, he records that:
We break up doors and floors and carry off the wood. One person tries to snatch from another. People fight over a piece of wood. People become petty, egoistic, and even cruel to one another. Soon we see the first Jewish policemen. They are supposed to maintain order in the ghetto. In time, they become a caste that helps the oppressors do their work. Over time, many things were done by the Gestapo with the help of the Jewish police. They help grab their brother by the throat; they help trip up their brother. (p.40, underlining mine)
I think it was Tolstoy who said that in war, the commanders plotting strategy don't know what's really happening on the ground, and those on the battlefield can't see the big picture or its strategic importance, only their own part in it, so both disparage the other. This is true of Yitskhok's perspective.
To read the rest of my review please read https://anzlitlovers.com/2026/01/27/t...
April 9, 2026
Riveting. It is astounding that this boy could so fully immerse himself into education and creative pursuits in the hell of the ghetto. He was wise beyond his years, a gifted writer, and a testament that we have the power to choose how we think and behave even in the most dire circumstances.
May 11, 2026
An amazing, chilling diary kept by a young (13-14 year old) Jewish boy in the Vilneh ghetto in 1942-43.
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews