Review by Booklist Review
Two new books are poignant and personal additions to Holocaust literature. Del Calzo has photographed 92 Jewish survivors who came to the U.S. Each full-page, black-and-white photo is accompanied by a terse text documenting the survivor's story. All these individuals have succeeded in the U.S., becoming successful business persons, authors, lecturers, doctors, artists, entertainers, educators, community leaders, and volunteers. They are photographed in their homes, offices, synagogues, and outdoors. Lifted from each text is a poignant quote. One, "Life is what is important," seems to sum up the whole book, which is eloquently introduced by Thomas Keneally, author of Schindler's List. Wolin, a professor of photography at Indiana University, combines documentary and art photography, oral history, and fragmented narrative in 43 contemporary black-and-white portraits of Holocaust survivors. He uses a technique of imprinting the survivors' words directly on their photographs. Opposite Wolin's portraits are snapshots of the survivors from years ago. One woman was born in Vienna in 1934; a faded picture shows her astride a horse on her grandparents' farm in Poland when she was three. Another woman, born in Paris in 1937, faces the opposite page containing two photos--one from 1940, in which she is holding a teddy bear, and one taken in 1947, when she was 10. Wolin's portraits, combined with the early snapshots, are a moving testimony to human dignity. --George Cohen
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Booklist Review
