Irena Sendler : mother of the children of the Holocaust /

This book offers the first English translation of the compelling heroine story of Irena Sendler, a Polish Catholic who organized the rescue of more than 2,500 Jewish children from the Warsaw ghetto during World War II.

In the fall of 1999, four young girls from Kansas began research for a high school history project. The students were inspired by a magazine article about Irena Sendler, and after discovering that Sendler was still alive, they exchanged letters with her and eventually traveled to Poland to meet with her. The play the students wrote as a result of their research and multiple interviews spawned worldwide interest in the epic story of one person who managed to save the lives of 2,500 children in Poland under German occupation.

This new translation brings the universally appealing story of Irena Sendler to an English-speaking audience for the first time. It contains moving accounts of courage and hope in the face of tremendous danger, cruelty, and terrifying uncertainty. It also portrays the unspeakable emotional distress suffered by the children's parents who chose to give them up, and communicates the decades of immense longing, loneliness, and guilt of the rescuees for having survived while their families did not.

* Based on sound scholarship and research while also being easy to read and accessible to a wide readership

* Provides a complete, chronological presentation of Sendler's life, from her childhood, education, and wartime humanitarian efforts to her postwar experiences, including her professional and personal life and her visit to Israel

* Presents unique information from letters and interviews with the now-elderly children Sendler rescued over 60 years ago, illuminating the dramatic influence she had upon their lives

* Contains several sections written in the voice of Irena Sendler, resulting in a lively, conversational first-person narrative that gives a reading experience akin to sitting with Sendler and hearing her story firsthand