January 12th.

Primo Levi

“..I thought about ..essential ambiguity of ..messages each of us leaves behind ..from birth to death ..and of our deep inability to reconstitute a person from them ..man who lives departing from ..man who writes ..anyone who writes ..even if only on walls ..writes in a code that is his alone ..and that ..others don’t know ..even he who speaks.” Primo Levi.

January 12th. 1940 300 Hordyszcze asylum inmates murdered.

January 12th. 1942 Precursor to Nuremberg Trials as Europe and China resolve to try All Axis Leaders War Criminals for war crimes:

“..whether they have ordered ..perpetrated ..or in any way participated in them.”

January 12th. 1943 20,000 Zambrow Jews deported Birkenau along with 1,000 Berlin Jews deported Birkenau.

“..observed by psychologists ..survivors ..are divided into two ..groups ..those who repress ..and those whose memory ..persists ..as though carved in stone. ..I have not forgotten a single thing. ..memory continues to restore ..events ..faces ..words ..sensations ..not a detail was lost. ..It is possible ..distance ..time has accentuated ..tendency to round out ..facts ..heighten ..colors ..this tendency ..temptation ..is an integral part of writing.”  Primo Levi.

January 12th. 1944 1,000 Jews from Stutthof Camp to Auschwitz. 95 Lodz Jews to Auschwitz. 23 Trieste Jews to Auschwitz. Allies attack at Monte Cassino.

If This Is a Man

     Shema.

 You who live safe

 In your warm houses,

 You who find on returning in the evening,

 Hot food and friendly faces:

 Consider if this is a man

 Who works in the mud

 Who does not know peace

 Who fights for a scrap of bread

 Who dies because of a yes or a no.

 Consider if this is a woman,

 Without hair and without name

 With no more strength to remember,

 Her eyes empty and her womb cold

 Like a frog in winter.

 Meditate that this came about:

 I commend these words to you.

 Carve them in your hearts

 At home, in the street,

 Going to bed, rising;

 Repeat them to your children,

 Or may your house fall apart,

 May illness impede you,

 May your children turn their faces from you.” Primo Levi.


One response to “January 12th.”

  1. Marisa Drucker Avatar
    Marisa Drucker

    Sometimes in history, you come across an atrocity so incomprehensible it’s lesson has to be learned no matter. The Holocaust, the struggle for Jews to exist at a time when they were being eliminated is hard to fathom.I came across a writer, quite by chance, and it appeared that Patrick Dempsey would deliver such comprehension as I would understand.I have not been disappointed,in the midst of such a challenge to humanity. Patricks first book paved the way for my owning all 6 books of his works. There is a clarity which opens the mind to what horrors are achieved, when we simply sit back and conform to indifference.I understand that Patrick has a commitment which does not falter as I see his work reason with those who witnessed what they too fail to understand.

    Thank you Patrick Dempsey

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