(= A HIS 360) Bearing Witness: Holocaust Diaries and Memoirs

Catalog description

A study in diaries, autobiographies, and memoirs of Jews written during and after the Nazi Holocaust. Considers the complex historical questions raised by such works, including: What can be learned about the Holocaust through autobiographical writing? To what extent were the authors aware of the scope of the attacks on European Jewry beyond their own immediate experience? What responses were available to Jews during this period? How did the authors make sense of their experiences? What are the merits and limits of autobiographical writing as a historical resource? How do accounts of the period change as authors' chronological proximity to the events increases? In what ways are memoirs of the Holocaust shaped by the events occurring at the time in which they written?