The Shadow of Death: The Holocaust in Lithuania

by Harry Gordon

Overview

Gordon describes the invasion of Kovno by the Soviets, and the later German takeover. He writes about the daily life of the working brigades, the ghetto bureaucracy, resistance fighters, and the horrors of Auschwitz and Dachau. Gordon says that the barbarities of the Holocaust were perpetrated not only by Germans, but also by Lithuanian nationals and rebel Ukranians.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780813143606
Publisher:	University Press of Kentucky
Publication date:	11/15/2022
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	204
File size:	2 MB
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Harry Gordon emigrated to the United States in 1949 and now lives in Madison, Wisconsin.

Editorial Reviews

When Russia annexed Lithuania in 1940, Jews, if not Christian Lithuanians, greeted the Red Army with flowers, recalls Gordon. But the following year, when Germany declared war against Russia, the then-16-year-old author's security as member of a large, close-knit family of affluent Kovno Jews would be shattered. In a Holocaust memoir made unique by its rare depiction of Nazi-occupied Lithuania and by its condemnation of the local Jewish council, Gordon bears witness to the brutality of Lithuanians and conqueror alike as he reconstructs his corner of hell from the German invasion to his 1944 rescue as a Dachau escapee, his two-year hospitalization and emigration to the U.S. in 1949. Although crudely written--``To Lithuanians Jewish blood tasted better than the best wine''; the Jewish police lived ``like parasites on someone else's blood''--the book makes a tremendous impact as we read of starvation, grueling work parties, betrayals, executions, Auschwitz and Dachau, the deaths of virtually all members of Gordon's family. After arriving in the U.S. with his Polish wife (met in a displaced persons' camp), the author's life, unfortunately, did not markedly right itself: he quickly divorced, then, with little else available to him, became a ``Yiddish peddler'' in Wisconsin. (Jan.)

Publishers Weekly - Publisher's Weekly

Gordon's memoir of surviving the Holocaust in Lithuania is told from the perspective of a youth who grew up in a large, supportive family circle but learned how to endure through his own wit and by confronting the worst of human nature. The Red Army's initial occupation of Kovno was followed by the Nazi invasion and the deportation of the region's Jews to Slobodka ghetto, where massacres and transport to German concentration camps eventually followed. Few survived, but Gordon preserves the record for the many in detailing major events; the ambivalent behavior of Lithuanians toward Jews; and the community organization, work, and routine of ghetto life. When Gordon conveys that he preferred death to life without his family and hoped for survival through patient endurance, the reader better understands the mind of the Holocaust victim. A simple and direct account for Holocaust collections and larger libraries of Eastern European history. See also Art Spiegelman's Maus, a Survivor's Tale II: And Here My Troubles Began , reviewed in this issue, p. 160.-- Rena Fowler, Northern Michigan Univ. Lib., Marquette

Library Journal

A gripping personal memoir, and account of the collective fate of Lithuanian Jewry, as well as a more general reminder that the barbarities of the Holocaust were perpetrated not only by the Germans but by Lithuanian nationals and rebel Ukrainians. Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

Booknews

A shocking story of the fate of Jews in the infamous Slobodka ghetto and the horrors of Auschwitz and Dochau.

B'nai B'rith Messenger

A gripping account of the horrors of the Holocaust from the perspective of the ghettos' poorest and weakest class.

Appalachian Quarterly

Graphically reminds us of the horrors of the Holocaust and of Harry Gordon's indomitable spirit which time and time again allowed him to face life and death with courage and faith.

Rabbi Meyer H. May

A powerful tribute to the human spirit and the will and determination of one human being to survive in a hell not of one's own making.

CCAR Journal: A Reform Jewish Quarterly

A timely reminder of a historic tragedy that the newly created nation would seemingly like to forget.

Jewish Post and Opinion

"A gripping account of the horrors of the Holocaust from the perspective of the ghettos' poorest and weakest class." — Appalachian Quarterly

"A shocking story of the fate of Jews in the infamous Slobodka ghetto and the horrors of Auschwitz and Dochau." — B'nai B'rith Messenger

"A powerful tribute to the human spirit and the will and determination of one human being to survive in a hell not of one's own making." — CCAR Journal: A Reform Jewish Quarterly

"A timely reminder of a historic tragedy that the newly created nation would seemingly like to forget." — Jewish Post and Opinion

"Preserves the record for the many in detailing major events; the ambivalent behavior of Lithuanians toward Jews; and the community organization, work, and routine of ghetto life." — Library Journal

"Graphically reminds us of the horrors of the Holocaust and of Harry Gordon's indomitable spirit which time and time again allowed him to face life and death with courage and faith." — Rabbi Meyer H. May

From the Publisher