This week, we listened to a book called “Address Unknown,” which is a series of letters sent back and forth between two friends/business partners, one Jewish and living in America, one non-Jewish and living in Germany. Listening to the book was a little bit surreal. To watch two people with immense love for each other and a long history together correspond through letters and watch a divide grow between them as Hitler and the Nazi party rise to power was crazy. I’ve never seen an actual example of a person being brainwashed by Hitler and going from being long time friends with a Jew, to having antisemitic views and an actual participant in Hitler’s regime. It just brings to life how Nazi propaganda actually worked.
The story of Max’s sister Griselle was quite heartbreaking. She was so brave to continue to put herself in the public eye knowing of the danger being Jewish put her in. Some might say it was a little bit stupid, but extremely brave nonetheless. To hear of Martin’s betrayal and the manner in which Griselle was killed was devastating, and I hate to say that I see where Martin was coming from. He most definitely would have been killed by the Nazis, him if not his whole family, if they had found Griselle hiding in his house. It’s sad to think how they didn’t even need a pretense of an excuse at that point to kill Jews. They just chased her down and murdered her.
Every time I read letters from the Holocaust, it just makes the horrible events that I have always learned about from a textbook more and more real. It’s amazing how reading the words of actual people that lived during these events can invoke new understandings of history.