What do you think?
Rate this book
The Auschwitz Album
This album, an extraordinary find, was originally discovered during the tumult of the first days after the liberation. It reveals how two SS photographers documented the arrival of shipments of Jews to the platform in the Birkenau concentration camp, the selection process, and their path to the gas chambers and the crematoria. The photographs also memorialize the piles of possessions left by the Jews which were sorted in the 'Canada' Barracks. They are accompanied by three articles that describe the development of the camp, the Holocaust of Hungarian Jewry, and the story of how the album was found; a fourth focuses on the camera as a historical tool. The 189 pictures, arranged in chronological order and reproduced in this album for the first time, are unusually powerful, not least because 70% of the people shown have been identified.
304 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1981
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
July 2, 2020
Let me start off by saying that I don't think I will be able do this book justice with my review. I consider it to be the most important book I have on my shelf, and I have a hard time finding the right words to describe just how much the content affected me. It contains dozens of photographs of a large group of people arriving at the train station in Auschwitz and being sent to the gas chambers shortly after. So this album is a photographical reflection of an entire day in Auschwitz during World War II!
I have read so many books on the horrors and the aftermath of the holocaust but this album is on unmatched level in terms of importance. Not only does it provide evidence of the holocaust but it also returns something to the victims that was stolen from them by their murderers: their identities, their faces, their stories. All of the sudden we are no longer just talking about a mere number of people getting killed systematically between 1941-1945 but instead, we're looking directly into the faces of two brothers standing at the train station not knowing they are about to get killed; we can see a little girl with no shoes on her feet; there is a picture of a physically disabled man sitting in a chair; photographs of mothers with their children, of rabbis, of brothers and sisters, of grandparents, of friends and strangers. You can see them! Their pain, their sorrow, their hopelessness, their anxiety, their fear. And that's what makes this book so extremely special and important to me. I literally cried looking at these photos that don't show any smiles. Just pure hopelessness. Such an important book!
I have read so many books on the horrors and the aftermath of the holocaust but this album is on unmatched level in terms of importance. Not only does it provide evidence of the holocaust but it also returns something to the victims that was stolen from them by their murderers: their identities, their faces, their stories. All of the sudden we are no longer just talking about a mere number of people getting killed systematically between 1941-1945 but instead, we're looking directly into the faces of two brothers standing at the train station not knowing they are about to get killed; we can see a little girl with no shoes on her feet; there is a picture of a physically disabled man sitting in a chair; photographs of mothers with their children, of rabbis, of brothers and sisters, of grandparents, of friends and strangers. You can see them! Their pain, their sorrow, their hopelessness, their anxiety, their fear. And that's what makes this book so extremely special and important to me. I literally cried looking at these photos that don't show any smiles. Just pure hopelessness. Such an important book!
September 15, 2026
This is easily the most disturbing book I have ever read. What shook me most was how forcefully the photographs restore humanity to the victims. Regardless of the photographers original intent presumably a German solider documenting the process the images inadvertently capture the sheer atrocity of the crime. The force deportation, imprisonment, and systematic murder of Jewish people in gas chambers and crematoria defies comprehension.
Even more jarring is the sheer confusion etched on everyone's faces. Rather than open terror, you see disbelief. They had no idea what fate awaited them. The final photographs taken just before people were led into the gas chambers capture an unsuspecting crowd children, young adults, and the elderly alike moments before their lives were stolen. The reality that Auschwitz existed at all is sickening, and seeing these final moments preserved on film is deeply unsettling.
I'm giving this 4.5/5 stars only because the layout could have been improved; presenting the photographs first followed by the historical context might have created a stronger narrative flow, though that may just come down to reading preference.
Even more jarring is the sheer confusion etched on everyone's faces. Rather than open terror, you see disbelief. They had no idea what fate awaited them. The final photographs taken just before people were led into the gas chambers capture an unsuspecting crowd children, young adults, and the elderly alike moments before their lives were stolen. The reality that Auschwitz existed at all is sickening, and seeing these final moments preserved on film is deeply unsettling.
I'm giving this 4.5/5 stars only because the layout could have been improved; presenting the photographs first followed by the historical context might have created a stronger narrative flow, though that may just come down to reading preference.
December 20, 2018
Ein sehr interessantes und ausführliches Buch über einen ungarischen Transport nach Auschwitz.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews