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We Are Here: talking with Australia's oldest Holocaust survivors
These are the last adult witnesses — in their own words.
When Adolf Hitler became Chancellor of Germany in 1933, he quickly began to realise his dream of a racially superior nation free of ‘inferior’ groups. His goal included the eradication of European Jewry, a plan that would ultimately claim six million lives. By 1945, almost two in three European Jews were dead. So were millions of other victims of Nazism.
For those who survived, liberation came with the enormous weight of guilt and memory as they began the second part of their lives, often in faraway places such as Australia, which would become home to one of the world’s highest per capita communities of Holocaust survivors.
Now the last of those adult survivors have reached an age once considered unattainable. They outlasted Nazism, and today, in their tenth and eleventh decades, have outlived most of their contemporaries. Eighteen of these Australians, originally from all over Europe, tell what it is like to have endured those years, and how they lived long after them.
When Adolf Hitler became Chancellor of Germany in 1933, he quickly began to realise his dream of a racially superior nation free of ‘inferior’ groups. His goal included the eradication of European Jewry, a plan that would ultimately claim six million lives. By 1945, almost two in three European Jews were dead. So were millions of other victims of Nazism.
For those who survived, liberation came with the enormous weight of guilt and memory as they began the second part of their lives, often in faraway places such as Australia, which would become home to one of the world’s highest per capita communities of Holocaust survivors.
Now the last of those adult survivors have reached an age once considered unattainable. They outlasted Nazism, and today, in their tenth and eleventh decades, have outlived most of their contemporaries. Eighteen of these Australians, originally from all over Europe, tell what it is like to have endured those years, and how they lived long after them.
240 pages, Kindle Edition
Published January 29, 2018
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Displaying 1 - 20 of 20 reviews
April 17, 2018
I was captivated from the first page and read the book in one day. I liked how the book as structured - first with the author giving an overview of what had happened before during and after WW2, of the survivor being interviewed. Then the interviewee spoke in his/her own words about life after liberation.
It was interesting to see both common threads in their experiences post-war and their differences. Some of the common themes were a wanting to get as far away from Europe as possible - hence the appeal of Australia. It was sad to read about how so many didn't speak about their experiences for a very long time because people did not believe them, when they first tried. It was also sad to read how many struggled to show emotion and love towards their children, even though they did indeed love them. Many also lost their belief in God.
This was a fascinating and an important read. These survivors should be given a voice. I just wished the book was longer.
It was interesting to see both common threads in their experiences post-war and their differences. Some of the common themes were a wanting to get as far away from Europe as possible - hence the appeal of Australia. It was sad to read about how so many didn't speak about their experiences for a very long time because people did not believe them, when they first tried. It was also sad to read how many struggled to show emotion and love towards their children, even though they did indeed love them. Many also lost their belief in God.
This was a fascinating and an important read. These survivors should be given a voice. I just wished the book was longer.
March 6, 2018
The years have gone on and now we are 70+ years since the end of the Second World War, and many of the survivors are 90+ years old. The author talks to a group of holocaust survivors who emigrated to Australia after the war, about their experiences during the war and the new life they made in their new homes.
Each story is pretty harrowing, it is hard to imagine enduring so much loss, and yet their is hope as they make new families of their own and beat the odds by surviving.
Each story is pretty harrowing, it is hard to imagine enduring so much loss, and yet their is hope as they make new families of their own and beat the odds by surviving.
March 31, 2018
I love hearing people's stories, and this book is full of experiences. After reading it right through I was reminded how abundantly wealthy and peaceful my life is, and was also reminded how important it is to tolerate the differences between us all. Plus, to treat everyone with kindness since I never know what brutality they have experienced in the past.
March 17, 2018
Unlike "The Tatooist of Auschwitz", Harari lets the survivors speak for themselves in their harrowing testimonies of the Holocaust. Preceding each is her introduction to and summary of their account; but, the strength of this collection is in the words of those who, against all odds, somehow survived. What strikes the reader is the range of responses - from bitter to bittersweet, from hopeful to resigned - and the consistent trauma that each has carried for these 70 years of survival. I always feel obligated to read the accounts of those who are strong enough to testify to a world in which some would still deny the Holocaust and of a world that stood by and did nothing. Harari writes with compassion and respect, allowing the oldest survivors to continue to break the silence. A "must read"!
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March 6, 2018Wonderful book. Heartfelt stories of some of Australia's Holocaust survivors and how they have lived their lives after the war. A book full of hope.
January 27, 2019
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:
We Are Here, Talking with Australia's Oldest Holocaust Survivors is, as its title suggests a collection of interviews with Holocaust survivors who were adults at the time. For Holocaust Memorial Day, I am going to share just one story from this remarkable collection of interviews.
To read the rest of my review please visit https://anzlitlovers.com/2019/01/27/w...
Holocaust Memorial Day is the day for everyone to remember the millions of people murdered in the Holocaust, under Nazi Persecution, and in the genocides which followed in Cambodia, Rwanda, Bosnia, and Darfur.
The theme for HMD 2019, Torn from home, encourages audiences to reflect on how the enforced loss of a safe place to call ‘home’ is part of the trauma faced by anyone experiencing persecution and genocide. ‘Home’ usually means a place of safety, comfort and security. On HMD 2019 we will reflect on what happens when individuals, families and communities are driven out of, or wrenched from their homes, because of persecution or the threat of genocide, alongside the continuing difficulties survivors face as they try to find and build new homes when the genocide is over.
We Are Here, Talking with Australia's Oldest Holocaust Survivors is, as its title suggests a collection of interviews with Holocaust survivors who were adults at the time. For Holocaust Memorial Day, I am going to share just one story from this remarkable collection of interviews.
The people interviewed in this book are part of an increasingly rare demographic: survivors of Nazism who have adult memories of the Holocaust. Born in 1926 or earlier, they were at least eighteen when the war ended. Percentage-wise, the war consumed a small fraction of their lives. But its legacy endures in their memories, their outlooks, and increasingly in their dreams. (p.7)
To read the rest of my review please visit https://anzlitlovers.com/2019/01/27/w...
August 13, 2020
This was a powerful book. A glimpse into the lives of eighteen Holocaust survivors, some who have lived full, happy lives, despite their horrific memories, and others who have simply survived. I found it fascinating to observe the themes of forgiveness, gratitude, revenge, atheism, anger, hope and belief in the goodness of humanity, repeated over and over. I also learnt a lot about how we should listen to people tell their stories. In many cases, these people wanted to share their memories, but people were either too skeptical or horrified to listen well and enable the healing that sharing could bring. It was in sharing with other survivors, who understood, and had walked similar journeys, that they often found relief.
The storytelling itself was slightly repetitive as the author summarised each survivor's story first, and followed it with the person's own version. Overall though it was a very worthwhile read.
The storytelling itself was slightly repetitive as the author summarised each survivor's story first, and followed it with the person's own version. Overall though it was a very worthwhile read.
March 19, 2018
We Are Here is a fascinating insight into the perspectives of Holocaust survivors, now aged in their 90s and 100s. Each of them was no more than 18 years old when World War II finished. Now many decades later, award winning journalist Fiona Harari interviewed eighteen people whose stories she shares to find out what age has brought them. Insight? Foregiveness? Perspective.
Many spent their post war lives vowing never to speak of the atrocities they endured ever again. But these eighteen are amongst the few survivors who can shed light on what they themselves witnessed and endured. Once they are gone, there will be no one left who was in those camps, ghettoes or hiding places.
At once warm, funny and tragic, We Are Here is also a timely reminder of the cost of forgetting history at a time in Western society similarly marked by intolerance, alarming politics and divisions.
Many spent their post war lives vowing never to speak of the atrocities they endured ever again. But these eighteen are amongst the few survivors who can shed light on what they themselves witnessed and endured. Once they are gone, there will be no one left who was in those camps, ghettoes or hiding places.
At once warm, funny and tragic, We Are Here is also a timely reminder of the cost of forgetting history at a time in Western society similarly marked by intolerance, alarming politics and divisions.
August 28, 2018
What can one say about this book...it evokes a ghastly past. The recollections of those who decided to converse with the author show a strength unknown to most. The harrowing circumstances these people confronted needs to be recorded and NEVER forgotten. In this current climate of political uncertainty and movement to the right (austria-italy-usa) nationalism as a means to whip up hate is all to easy. This book needs to be on school curriculums so the younger generation are privy to the cruelty that one sect of people can bring upon another for no other reason but their religion.
You will have tears but how could you not....
You will have tears but how could you not....
February 3, 2019
A powerful and uplifting record of people who have endured unthinkably cruel hardships. Each interviewee was a young adult as the wave of Hitler's madness engulfed Germany then spread like a poisonous virus alongside the advancing Nazis. These people lost so much, but their dignity, honesty and humanity shines in Harari's sensitive and succinct account. This is what I call essential reading.
February 27, 2018
A series of interviews with adult survivors who migrated to Australia. It was interesting to read the different perspectives on what had happened and also how they view life.
A good read especially in light of the approved Polish laws re: holocaust.
A good read especially in light of the approved Polish laws re: holocaust.
March 7, 2018
A book full of stories of people who are national living treasures. Everyone should read this, seriously. Just left me wanting more, otherwise would have been five stars.
May 2, 2018
It's different to other Holocaust books that I've read as it focuses on what happened after and how the events impacted their lives. It was very interesting seeing all of their responses.
June 12, 2020
A powerful narrative told with lots of sensitivity of the Holocaust survivors along with actual interviews wth these survivors.
January 28, 2021
very good. Wish it had more detail about each survivor. just kinda skimmed over each person very quickly and you never get a sense of them being a real person, not just a series of historical events.
October 10, 2021
An incredible insight to a most heart breaking time.
February 27, 2022
Someone needs to put this on someone’s desk, hmmmm
January 2, 2023
Poignant and raw. Stories that have to be told and never lost
January 18, 2023
This was a really interesting read.
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May 9, 2018Fiona Harari’s We Are Here: Talking with Australia’s Oldest Holocaust Survivors is a welcome addition to the body of knowledge about one of history’s greatest crimes … Not only are these stories of the horrors of the concentration and labour camps, but they are an assertion, a shout of triumph, We Are Here,we made it when you didn’t expect us to and some of us have even had good lives.
Sydney Morning Herald
Sydney Morning Herald
Displaying 1 - 20 of 20 reviews