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Sourcebooks (2021), 352 pages
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Biography & Autobiography. History. Judaica. Nonfiction. HTML: The Nazis asked him to swear allegiance to Hitler, betraying his country, his friends, and everything he believed in. He refused. Poland, 1939. Professional photographer Wilhelm Brasse is deported to Auschwitz-Birkenau and finds himself in a deadly race to survive, assigned to work as the camp's intake photographer and take "identity pictures" of prisoners as they arrive by the trainload. Brasse soon discovers his photography skills are in demand from Nazi guards as well, who ask him to take personal portraits for them to send to their families and girlfriends. Behind the camera, Brasse is safe from the terrible fate that so many of his fellow prisoners meet. But over the course of five years, the horrifying scenes his lens capture, including inhumane medical "experiments" led by Josef Mengele, change Brasse forever. Based on the true story of Wilhelm Brasse, The Auschwitz Photographer is a stark black-and-white reminder of the horrors of the Holocaust. This gripping work of World War II narrative nonfiction takes readers behind the barbed wire fences of the world's most feared concentration camp, bringing Brasse's story to life as he clicks the shutter button thousands of times before ultimately joining the Resistance, defying the Nazis, and defiantly setting down his camera for good..… (more)
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LibraryThing member eduscapes
Timely Take-Aways for Life-Long Learning
The Sisters of Auschwitz: The True Story of Two Jewish Sisters’ Resistance in the Heart of Nazi Territory
Roxane van Iperen, August 2021, HarperCollins
Themes: history, Jewish, World War II, Holocaust
The Auschwitz Photographer: The Forgotten Story of the WWII
Luca Crippa, Maurizio Onnis, Jennifer Higgins (translated by)
September 2021, Sourcebooks
Themes: history, biography, survival, World War II, Holocaust
The Dressmakers of Auschwitz: The True Story of the Women Who Sewed to Survive
Lucy Adlington, September 2021, HarperCollins
Themes: history, Jewish, World War II, Holocaust
Since the end of World War II, many nonfiction works have shared the horrific atrocities of Auschwitz. However, three recent titles explore the Holocaust from unusual perspectives including a photographer, dressmakers, and sisters. These powerful stories chronicle the variety of ways prisoners were able to survive.
THE SISTERS OF AUSCHWITZ shares the story of two sisters who joined the Dutch Resistance. From publishing an underground newspaper to hiding refugees, they were working at a resistance center when betrayed and sent to Auschwitz.
THE DRESSMAKERS OF AUSCHWITZ examines the experiences of seamstresses who survived the gas chambers by creating high fashion dresses for elite Nazi women. At the same time, these brave women played a role in camp resistance.
THE AUSCHWITZ PHOTOGRAPHER tells the true story of Wilhelm Brasse who recorded the horrors of the deadliest concentration camp in WWII. He was first assigned to the photographic identification unit and later to Josef Mengele’s horrific laboratory. He survived by taking 50,000+ photographs over a five year period.
Let’s explore seven timely take-aways for life-long learners:
1) Jewish sisters Janny and Lien Brilleslijper were active in the Dutch resistance. They were with Anne Frank and her family on the train to Auschwitz.
2) The High Nest is an example of a secret refuge near Amsterdam that served as an important safe house during World War II.
3) The Upper Tailoring Studio was a fashion workshop housed at Auschwitz and created to cater to the wives of SS officers and Berlin’s wealthy Nazis.
4) Two dozen women prisoners sewed elegant gowns from fabrics and clothing plundered from across Europe.
5) Wilhelm Brasse was able to save thousands of photographs that provided evidence of Nazi atrocities including human experiments.
6) Upon entering Auschwitz, identity portrait photographs were taken of each prisoner including from the front and each side.
7) From nurses and dressmakers to photographers, those who were selected to work at Auschwitz were more likely to survive than other prisoners.
Timely Take-Aways for Life-Long Learning
Whether helping educators keep up-to-date in their subject-areas, promoting student reading in the content-areas, or simply encouraging nonfiction leisure reading, teacher librarians need to be aware of the best new titles across the curriculum and how to activate life-long learning. - Annette Lamb, Teacher Librarian: The Journal for School Library Professionals
The Sisters of Auschwitz: The True Story of Two Jewish Sisters’ Resistance in the Heart of Nazi Territory
Roxane van Iperen, August 2021, HarperCollins
Themes: history, Jewish, World War II, Holocaust
The Auschwitz Photographer: The Forgotten Story of the WWII
Show More
Prisoner Who Documented Thousands of Lost SoulsLuca Crippa, Maurizio Onnis, Jennifer Higgins (translated by)
September 2021, Sourcebooks
Themes: history, biography, survival, World War II, Holocaust
The Dressmakers of Auschwitz: The True Story of the Women Who Sewed to Survive
Lucy Adlington, September 2021, HarperCollins
Themes: history, Jewish, World War II, Holocaust
Since the end of World War II, many nonfiction works have shared the horrific atrocities of Auschwitz. However, three recent titles explore the Holocaust from unusual perspectives including a photographer, dressmakers, and sisters. These powerful stories chronicle the variety of ways prisoners were able to survive.
THE SISTERS OF AUSCHWITZ shares the story of two sisters who joined the Dutch Resistance. From publishing an underground newspaper to hiding refugees, they were working at a resistance center when betrayed and sent to Auschwitz.
THE DRESSMAKERS OF AUSCHWITZ examines the experiences of seamstresses who survived the gas chambers by creating high fashion dresses for elite Nazi women. At the same time, these brave women played a role in camp resistance.
THE AUSCHWITZ PHOTOGRAPHER tells the true story of Wilhelm Brasse who recorded the horrors of the deadliest concentration camp in WWII. He was first assigned to the photographic identification unit and later to Josef Mengele’s horrific laboratory. He survived by taking 50,000+ photographs over a five year period.
Let’s explore seven timely take-aways for life-long learners:
1) Jewish sisters Janny and Lien Brilleslijper were active in the Dutch resistance. They were with Anne Frank and her family on the train to Auschwitz.
2) The High Nest is an example of a secret refuge near Amsterdam that served as an important safe house during World War II.
3) The Upper Tailoring Studio was a fashion workshop housed at Auschwitz and created to cater to the wives of SS officers and Berlin’s wealthy Nazis.
4) Two dozen women prisoners sewed elegant gowns from fabrics and clothing plundered from across Europe.
5) Wilhelm Brasse was able to save thousands of photographs that provided evidence of Nazi atrocities including human experiments.
6) Upon entering Auschwitz, identity portrait photographs were taken of each prisoner including from the front and each side.
7) From nurses and dressmakers to photographers, those who were selected to work at Auschwitz were more likely to survive than other prisoners.
Timely Take-Aways for Life-Long Learning
Whether helping educators keep up-to-date in their subject-areas, promoting student reading in the content-areas, or simply encouraging nonfiction leisure reading, teacher librarians need to be aware of the best new titles across the curriculum and how to activate life-long learning. - Annette Lamb, Teacher Librarian: The Journal for School Library Professionals
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LibraryThing member jetangen4571
translated, nonfiction, WW2, biography, survival, Jews, prisoners-of-war, real-horror, never-again, bravery, historical-places-events, historical-research, history, survivor's guilt*****
Photographing the deeds of evil as a means of staying alive.
This one man with notable photographical skills was
Translated from the Italian by Jennifer Higgins.
I requested and received a free temporary ebook from Sourcebooks via NetGalley. Thank you.
Never again.
Photographing the deeds of evil as a means of staying alive.
This one man with notable photographical skills was
Show More
German and Polish and made to photograph the murdered before they were gassed. The narrative is presented in prose as if it was fiction. But it is not. It is a documentation of real horror, just as the photos documented who was murdered at Auschwitz and when. There was even an officer with a fondness for pictures of tattoos who ordered photos of them. One particularly beautiful was on a man's back and the photographer was shown the skin tacked out for tanning as the officer was having it made into a book cover. Well, that's just one example of the horrors, and that doesn't include the things done to political prisoners and others. There are a few pictures and the documentation at the end.Translated from the Italian by Jennifer Higgins.
I requested and received a free temporary ebook from Sourcebooks via NetGalley. Thank you.
Never again.
Show Less
LibraryThing member Bookish59
In 1939, William Brasse, a young Pole, refuses to swear loyalty to hitler. In March 1940 he is captured and sent to Sanok, Tarnow and then to Auschwitz. Used as slave labor to demolish homes to make room for roadways, move corpses to crematorium, and kitchen work. In 1941, the political department
Brasse worked here taking portrait photographs of political prisoners, Jewish prisoners, and captured resistance fighters virtually all to be tortured, starved, over-worked and killed within months. Brasse is determined to do whatever it takes to survive as long as he can. Because he learned photography as a teen from his uncle, excelled at it, and avoided being outside the studio more than absolutely necessary, he survives until January 1945 when he is marched to Ebensee Concentration Camp. Months later, in May, Ebensee is liberated by American soldiers.
He tried making his subjects as comfortable as possible under the circumstances. He was witness to some of the most egregious evil man could inflict on man. Ordered by Mengele and other doctors to photograph starved Jewish girls, girls on whom ‘medical’ experiments were done, usually twins as well as those with eyes of different colors, prisoners who developed open facial wounds exposing muscle and bone, young women who were sedated and had their uteruses removed, corpses who had organs removed, etc.
Brasse’s photography was perhaps too good. Nazi officers often asked him to take their portraits to send home to their families. At first Brasse couldn’t understand why the nazis would document their heinous crimes. Over time he realized many of them had been brainwashed into believing they were doing good work, ridding the world of ‘inferior races.'
During the last year of working in Auschwitz Brasse’s commitment to survive is overtaken by his need to bear witness. He carefully makes contact with resistance prisoners, providing photos and other documentation of what goes on in Auschwitz. He doesn’t want to die, of course, but if caught, he will know he’s done his best to let the outside world see the truth. And in an even more ambitious effort to preserve most of the 40,000 – 50,000 photographs he has taken, he aborts the order by his direct boss, Walter to burn all the photos. And blockades the studio so no one else can burn or destroy the photographs. He never sees or enters that photo studio again!
Book is very clear and well-written.
But… to me, a Jewess, I felt the authors kept the magnitude of the horror of Auschwitz to the margins of the story. Yes, we do ‘see’ Brasse experience terror and anxiety at what he had to photograph. And learn about what he sees outside his window; kapos beating prisoners to death, corpses piled up and being moved to the crematorium.
I still felt that the actual nightmare experience of Auschwitz (and all the concentration camps), from crowding civilians onto trains without food, water or sanitation, the torture, medical experiments, the mass murder of Jews, political prisoners, the Romani, homosexuals, the handicapped and mentally ill, the old, weak and sick, and anyone the nazis didn’t like was choreographed into the background so that Brasse and his life would be front and center.
And the reader doesn’t know for sure how Basse felt about Jews. He was horrified by the condition of the 4 emaciated Jewish twin girls, and some of the other Jewish subjects of medical experiments. But I don’t think he tried helping Jewish prisoners in any major way.
Show More
assigns him to the identification photo studio. Brasse worked here taking portrait photographs of political prisoners, Jewish prisoners, and captured resistance fighters virtually all to be tortured, starved, over-worked and killed within months. Brasse is determined to do whatever it takes to survive as long as he can. Because he learned photography as a teen from his uncle, excelled at it, and avoided being outside the studio more than absolutely necessary, he survives until January 1945 when he is marched to Ebensee Concentration Camp. Months later, in May, Ebensee is liberated by American soldiers.
He tried making his subjects as comfortable as possible under the circumstances. He was witness to some of the most egregious evil man could inflict on man. Ordered by Mengele and other doctors to photograph starved Jewish girls, girls on whom ‘medical’ experiments were done, usually twins as well as those with eyes of different colors, prisoners who developed open facial wounds exposing muscle and bone, young women who were sedated and had their uteruses removed, corpses who had organs removed, etc.
Brasse’s photography was perhaps too good. Nazi officers often asked him to take their portraits to send home to their families. At first Brasse couldn’t understand why the nazis would document their heinous crimes. Over time he realized many of them had been brainwashed into believing they were doing good work, ridding the world of ‘inferior races.'
During the last year of working in Auschwitz Brasse’s commitment to survive is overtaken by his need to bear witness. He carefully makes contact with resistance prisoners, providing photos and other documentation of what goes on in Auschwitz. He doesn’t want to die, of course, but if caught, he will know he’s done his best to let the outside world see the truth. And in an even more ambitious effort to preserve most of the 40,000 – 50,000 photographs he has taken, he aborts the order by his direct boss, Walter to burn all the photos. And blockades the studio so no one else can burn or destroy the photographs. He never sees or enters that photo studio again!
Book is very clear and well-written.
But… to me, a Jewess, I felt the authors kept the magnitude of the horror of Auschwitz to the margins of the story. Yes, we do ‘see’ Brasse experience terror and anxiety at what he had to photograph. And learn about what he sees outside his window; kapos beating prisoners to death, corpses piled up and being moved to the crematorium.
I still felt that the actual nightmare experience of Auschwitz (and all the concentration camps), from crowding civilians onto trains without food, water or sanitation, the torture, medical experiments, the mass murder of Jews, political prisoners, the Romani, homosexuals, the handicapped and mentally ill, the old, weak and sick, and anyone the nazis didn’t like was choreographed into the background so that Brasse and his life would be front and center.
And the reader doesn’t know for sure how Basse felt about Jews. He was horrified by the condition of the 4 emaciated Jewish twin girls, and some of the other Jewish subjects of medical experiments. But I don’t think he tried helping Jewish prisoners in any major way.
Show Less
ISBN
1728242207 / 9781728242200