The Drowned and the Saved
| Author | : | |
| Rating | : | 4.33 (613 Votes) |
| Asin | : | 1501167634 |
| Format Type | : | paperback |
| Number of Pages | : | 208 Pages |
| Publish Date | : | 2015-11-18 |
| Language | : | English |
DESCRIPTION:
This is an essential book both for students and literary readers. In his final book before his death, Primo Levi returns once more to his time at Auschwitz in a moving meditation on memory, resiliency, and the struggle to comprehend unimaginable tragedy.Drawing on history, philosophy, and his own personal experiences, Levi asks if we have already begun to forget about the Holocaust. His last book before his death, Levi returns to the subject that would define his reputation as a writer and a witness.Levi breaks his book into eight essays, ranging from topics like the un
He writes of "useless violence" inflicted by the guards on prisoners and then concludes the book with a discussion of the Germans who have written to him about their complicity in the event. The book was his third on the subject, following Survival in Auschwitz (1947) and The Reawakening (1963). . This book, published months after Italian writer Primo Levi's suicide in 1987, is a small but powerful look at Auschwitz, the hell where Levi was imprisoned during World War II. In all, he tries to make sense of something that--as he knew--made no sense at all. Removed from the experience by time and age, Levi chose to serve more as an observer of the camp than the passionate young man of his previous work
DGB said which is the book's great strength: the insights he draws from them and. A truly sobering book. It is hard to read for long periods of time -- a break is needed just to clear one's head a bit before re-entering that time and place. Levi feared the lessons of the holocaust were being attenuated over time and the fact that this book is hard to get is ironic confirmation of that fear. This is the last book he wrote. The realism and specificity he includes are almost numbing, but they are not gratuitous, which is the book's great strength: the insights he draws from them and the exhortations that come from those insights are personal and persuasive. I would wish this book had wider circulation -- a hard but very va. "A must read for those trying to understand how it could have happened" according to Lulu. I read this after seeing the film "Son of Saul" which I found disturbing in a way that other Holocaust films were not. Levi's book is an amazing, thought-provoking attempt to understand what can never be understood. He teaches the reader about the complexity of the horrors that the prisoners endured, especially those who were given the most horrific tasks in the camps. I am now better equipped to answer the outrageous views of those who today believe the Jews were weaklings who went "like sheep to the slaughter.". "Thoughtful, intelligent, meaningful, and universal." according to John Hovig. "The Drowned and the Saved" is the final book of Primo Levi (1919-1987), a Jewish-Italian chemist who survived the death camp of Auschwitz, and turned to authorship in his later years. This book is a group of a half-dozen related essays, each exploring a specific aspect of Levi's view of the Holocaust's causes and effects.He begins with the concept of "good faith", wondering whether believing a lie excuses it. He notes that oppressors lie to save themselves from believing they are evil, and victims lie to save themselves from believing they suffer. He explores the moral zone between black and white, noting that anybody can be a tough kille