Slonim - Gazing at the stars: memories of a child survivor

One thing I remember learning at school is that there is no word in ancient Hebrew for history. In its place is the word zikaron . Im not sure why this piece of information has stuck with me over the years, but it has. I remember my teacher explaining that the literal translation of zikaron is memory, but that something is lacking in this translation. There is something about the words meaning that just cannot be conveyed in the English language, she said.

Perhaps this is because history and memory are indistinguishable in Judaism. The Jewish past is not understood as a series of events arranged in chronological order, but as a continuous tradition. To be part of Jewish history is to practise the Jewish tradition, and to find meaning in that tradition is to become part of a shared memory. Zikaron is not just the recollection of past experiences; it is also the communal memory of an entire way of life.

I was reminded of this word when I started working with Eva Slonim on her memoirs. Every Tuesday, for around four months, we would sit together in her study and talk about her past. I was amazed by the facility of Evas memory; I often had to remind myself that she was only twelve or thirteen years old when most of these events took place. I was in awe of her ability to remain focused and composed while talking about moments of unimaginable suffering, of complete horror. She told me her story with perfect stoicism, almost as if it were someone elses.

I recorded all our conversations; listening back to them, as I later did, was more gut-wrenching than the conversations themselves. When I was not in Evas warm and reassuring presence, I found the evil she encountered as a child overwhelming and incomprehensible.

It was when I started transcribing our conversations that I really heard the voice of the young Eva. I was seeing and experiencing history through a childs eyes. There has been such a huge emphasis on systematically archiving what happened during the Holocaust. This is of course necessary, but sometimes it can make history look like cold, hard facts, and the sounds of individual suffering can be swallowed up.

Eva and I spoke at length about why she wanted to write this book. One theme we continuously came back to was testimony. Eva is driven by a sense of responsibility to tell future generations about what happened to her and her family. She wants to teach her grandchildren about Jewish life before the Holocaust, to ennoble the idea of Jewish continuity, and to teach and warn the world at large about humanitys potential for evil.

I once suggested to Eva that another function of testimony is more personal. It allows individuals the opportunity to reflect on what has happened to them. It may offer catharsis or a sense of release, perhaps even a new perspective from which to interpret their past experiences.

Eva shook her head. No, she said. There is no meaning in these memories. Reliving these memories is only difficult. Im doing it for the next generation.

When you read this book, then, you will hear two voices. One is Eva as we know her now, a historian speaking with the caution and guardedness of someone who has built an internal wall against extraordinary suffering. The other is the Eva who experienced this trauma for the first time, the one who remembers, the girl who first interpreted her experiences with the naivety and innocence of childhood.

In Evas testimony history and memory are entwined in one expression. It is almost impossible now to interpret anything meaningful from what happened to Eva. The Holocaust still looms as a break from tradition, a fracture in Jewish history in Evas words, the final goodbye to an entire way of life.

These memoirs are, first and foremost, an exercise of incredible courage. I believe this courage comes from Evas knowledge that her story will be recorded. She writes for zikaron , the hope that, sometime in the future, her testimony along with those of her peers will become part of the Jewish tradition, told over and over, lived over and over. This record of a personal memory will become part of the shared memory of the Jewish people.

Oscar Schwartz

Readers will find a glossary of the foreign-language terms used in this book on pages 178180.