[Penguin Books]
Kategoria: Książki / Literatura obcojęzyczna
, and eventually they struck up a remarkable friendship, even a
partnership. The Cut Out Girl braids together a powerful
recreation of that intensely harrowing childhood story of Lientje's
with...
Pełen opis produktu 'Cut Out Girl' »
The extraordinary true story of a young Jewish girl in Holland
during World War II, who hides from the Nazis in the homes of an
underground network of foster families, one of them the author's
grandparents Bart van Es left Holland for England many years ago,
but one story from his Dutch childhood never left him. It was a
mystery of sorts: a young Jewish girl named Lientje had been taken
in during the war by relatives and hidden from the Nazis, handed
over by her parents, who understood the danger they were in all too
well. The girl had been raised by her foster family as one of their
own, but then, well after the war, there was a falling out, and
they were no longer in touch. What was the girl's side of the
story, Bart wondered? What really happened during the war, and
after? So began an investigation that would consume Bart van Es's
life, and change it. After some sleuthing, he learned that Lientje
was now in her 80s and living in Amsterdam. Somewhat reluctantly,
she agreed to meet him, and eventually they struck up a remarkable
friendship, even a partnership. The Cut Out Girl braids together a
powerful recreation of that intensely harrowing childhood story of
Lientje's with the present-day account of Bart's efforts to piece
that story together, including bringing some old ghosts back into
the light. It is a story rich with contradictions. There is great
bravery and generosity--first Lientje's parents, giving up their
beloved daughter, and then the Dutch families who face great danger
from the Nazi occupation for taking Lientje and other Jewish
children in. And there are more mundane sacrifices a family under
brutal occupation must make to provide for even the family they
already have. But tidy Holland also must face a darker truth,
namely that it was more cooperative in rounding up its Jews for the
Nazis than any other Western European country; that is part of
Lientje's story too. Her time in hiding was made much more
terrifying by the energetic efforts of the local Dutch authorities,
zealous accomplices in the mission of sending every Jew, man, woman
and child, East to their extermination. And Lientje was not always
particularly well treated, and sometimes, Bart learned, she was
very badly treated indeed. The Cut Out Girl is an astonishment, a
deeply moving reckoning with a young girl's struggle for survival
during war, a story about the powerful love of foster families but
also the powerful challenges, and about the ways our most painful
experiences define us but also can be redefined, on a more honest
level, even many years after the fact. A triumph of subtlety,
decency and unflinching observation, The Cut Out Girl is a
triumphant marriage of many keys of writing, ultimately blending
them into an extraordinary new harmony, and a deeper truth.
