Book Review

George  Santayana wrote (in The Life of Reason, 1905): “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” For more than seventy years the world remembers the Holocaust that ravaged Europe. There are few survivors to tell of the horrors in the camps as well as the local citizens who risked their lives to hide or transport Jews.

Many Holocaust survivors have documented their ordeal so the world has a way to learn about and remember the past.  One such survivor was Hilde Jacobsthal, mother of Rita Goldberg, author of, Motherland, Growing Up With The Holocaust, who writes,”I am the child of a woman who survived the Holocaust not by the skin of her teeth but heroically.”

This deeply moving and dramatic narrative about the twentieth-century recalls Edmund de Waal’s, The Hare With Amber Eyes.”  Goldberg introduces the extraordinary story of her mother, Hilde Jacobsthal, a close friend of Anne Frank’s family who was fifteen when the Nazis invaded Holland.  Hilde fled to Belgium living out the war years in a tumultuous set of circumstances. *

The 2017 Holocaust Day program at Temple Beth Israel in Waltham was honored to have Rita Goldberg speak about her family during the war years.  The audience was so taken by her words many purchased her book and we invited Ms. Goldberg to come back on July 16, 2017 to delve deeper into the story.

A breakfast will be served at 10 AM at Temple Beth Israel ($10.00 pp) prior to the discussion.  You do not have to have read the book to enjoy this program.  In fact, you might decide to buy a copy to spend time with Hilde.  Books are also available at public libraries.

The community is invited to attend this event.  Kindly R.S.V.P. before July 7, 2017 to 781-275-2327 or ELLES123@AOL.COM.  Payment at the door with a reservation.

*Taken from the book jacket.