Between Dignity and Despair: Jewish Life in Nazi Germany

by Marion A. Kaplan

Between Dignity and Despair draws on the extraordinary memoirs, diaries, interviews, and letters of Jewish women and men to give us the first intimate portrait of Jewish life in Nazi Germany.

Kaplan tells the story of Jews in Germany not from the hindsight of the Holocaust, nor by focusing on the persecutors, but from the bewildered and ambiguous perspective of Jews trying to navigate their daily lives in a world that was becoming more and more insane. Answering the charge that Jews should have left earlier, Kaplan shows that far from seeming inevitable, the Holocaust was impossible to foresee precisely because Nazi repression occurred in irregular and unpredictable steps until the massive violence of Novemer 1938. Then the flow of emigration turned into a torrent, only to be stopped by the war. By that time Jews had been evicted from their homes, robbed of their possessions and their livelihoods, shunned by their former friends, persecuted by their neighbors, and driven into forced labor. For those trapped in Germany, mere survival became a nightmare of increasingly desperate options. Many took their own lives to retain at least some dignity in death; others went
underground and endured the fears of nightly bombings and the even greater terror of being discovered by the Nazis. Most were murdered. All were pressed to the limit of human endurance and human loneliness.

Focusing on the fate of families and particularly women's experience, Between Dignity and Despair takes us into the neighborhoods, into the kitchens, shops, and schools, to give us the shape and texture, the very feel of what it was like to be a Jew in Nazi Germany.

Genres: History, Holocaust, Nonfiction, World War II, Germany, European History, Memoir

304 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1998

About the author

Marion Kaplan is Skirball Professor of Modern Jewish History at New York University. She is the author of Between Dignity and Despair: Jewish Life in Nazi Germany and a three-time winner of the National Jewish Book Award.

Reviews

[Lewis Weinstein · Rating 5 out of 5]

UPDATE 4-21-18 ... I've read several more chapters ... mainly focused on forced labor and deportations ... how could any people be so inhuman as Germany under the Nazis?

... After Germany went to war, Nazis accelerated their economic and social persecution of Jews … confiscated savings … conscripted labor … denied access to public spaces … reduction of food rations for Jews - denied legumes, fruit & meat ... Bartering for food ... Shopping limited to one hour per day ... Prohibition against buying canned foods, Fish, poultry, Coffee, milk ... The Gestapo made sporadic House searches to make sure Jews were not hiding forbidden food and that yellow stars work tightly sewn on closing ... These visits often included physical attacks and destruction of furniture ... Jews not permitted to buy shoes, lingerie and clothing ... Sell furniture (and books!) each time Jews were forced to move to smaller apartments ... denied coal, apartments were freezing ... an unending accumulation of humiliation and anxiety ... Life was a state of perpetual fear

... When Jews met to share a meal together, they each had to bring their own silverware, since everyone had already given up everything but a single spoon knife and fork preach first

... Many German Jews were driven by their despair to seek a "death of their own" … they were stealing their death from the Nazis … they believed their families what understand … they were preserving a sense of their own dignity and agency ... Many Jews committed suicide whether the Nazis ordered them to help organize deportations … many of these were carefully planned events … joint suicides - husband and wife, sisters … fresh sheets and flowers ... wearing military metals earned in the great war

***

UPDATE 10-30-17 ... you can feel the pain on every page ... here are excerpts from the chapter on emigration in 1939 ... still more to read as I move along with the sequel to A FLOOD OF EVIL

A Flood of Evil

... We are driven to despair … we have filed applications for entry permits to Switzerland, Denmark, and Sweden … all in vain, although we had good connections in each of those countries … we obtained an entry permit for Mexico, but never received the visa ... in August 1939, we actually did get a permit for England, but it cam only 10 days before the outbreak of war, and we didn't have time ... In the spring of 1940 we receive an entry permit from Portugal ... Then came the invasion of France and a stream of refugees poured into Portugal and all of the issued permits were recalled

... in Berlin, the Gestapo set up a one-stop emigration bureau … where the emigrating Jew was fleeced, totally and completely, in the manner of an assembly line … when they entered they were still the owners of an apartment, perhaps a business, a bank account, and some savings ... one possession after another was taken until they had been reduced to stateless beggars, grasping one remaining possession - an exit visa

... about half of the Jews who had lived in Germany in 1933 got out … those who remained were murdered

***

So sad to read ... a documentation of the Nazi web tightening around German Jews ... their confusion and panic and efforts to leave ... the changing roles of women forced to assume greater responsibilities.

SELECTED EXCERPTS ...

... Jewish women were (compared to Jewish men) ... more sensitive to discrimination ... more eager to leave Germany ... more willing to face uncertainty abroad

... many Jewish women experimented with new behaviors never before attempted by any German women ... interceding with the authorities on behalf of their men ... selling their homes on their own ... seeking paid employment for the first time ... deciding on countries of refuge on their own

... in their daily interactions, all Germans, from Nazi officials to ordinary Germans on the tram, had extraordinary power over Jews ... this became normal

... The law became a source of persecution … perhaps the most frightening aspect was being deprived of the protection of law

... Many Germans used the vulnerable position of Jews for their own advantage … blackmail … demanding receipts for bills they had never paid … legal action against them was impossible … tenants refused to pay rent … landlords refused to honor rental contracts

... Dismissing Jewish teachers provided opportunities for the unemployed … likewise non-Jewish doctors profited from the removal of Jewish doctors … Government insurance agencies threatened patients who continued to go to Jewish doctors … Jewish doctors (male and female) lost their health insurance affiliation

... even when Jews gathered in private homes … they feared they were being watched by neighbors or by the Gestapo

... Confusing signals made the decision to leave difficult … Random kindnesses by German neighbors led Jews to conclude that Germany would never tolerate the most radical Nazi programs

... Jews faced requests for bribes and tributes at every step of the way … Gestapo agents, civil servants, packers and movers, even people in foreign consulates

... A Jewish woman is still thankful today that her mother save their lives by having sex the bureaucrat who then provided their exit papers

[Andrew]

I started by wanting to know how Germany had gone from a country where Jews were basically accepted, despite the occasional, rough patch, more than most any other place in Europe, to a charnel house. What I wound up learning about was how people turn on their neighbors with remarkable alacrity given a mixture of economic uncertainty and nationalist discourse. Little by little, rights are stripped away. Little by little, discrimination becomes more socially acceptable. As those rights are stripped away, it becomes more practically difficult for the majority population to engage with the minority, socially, commercially, or otherwise, and so the majority decides it's easier to keep their heads down, even if they don't have personal beef with the minority. As that discrimination becomes more socially acceptable, the social pressure to discriminate as well from other members of the majority increases, and again, the majority decides it's easier to keep their heads down. And when stories about death camps in the east come... those who don’t know definitely do know that it's better for them not to know.

This was Germany in the 1930s. It is Western Myanmar and Gaza and Yemen today. Kashmir isn't looking good right now, either. It might happen to you soon, in your country. You might be the majority. You might be the minority. Take heed, motherfuckers.

[catherine ♡ · Rating 5 out of 5]

Definitely a very eye-opening book, and the fact that I read it on my own (and wasn't forced to read it for school) meant that I could take everything in at my own pace. I thought this book was the perfect combination of straight hard facts and gut-wrenching retellings by those who had lived through Nazi Germany. Between Dignity and Despair made me realize that how it all it began was just as terrifying as how it all ended.

[Kate Forsyth · Rating 5 out of 5]

This powerful and heart-rending book draws on many different memoirs, diaries, letters and post-war interviews to give us an extraordinary insight into what it was like to be a Jew in Germany during the Nazi years. It shows how the many small humiliations and unkindnesses of the early years gradually began to drag the Jewish community inexorably towards the horror of the Holocaust, and gives a sense of how that horror continues to shadow those that survived.

[Leslie · Rating 5 out of 5]

In her book Between Dignity and Despair, Marion Kaplan contends that standard histories of the Nazi Era and the plight of Europe's Jewish population too often focus on the perpetrators and their mechanistic approach to mass murder. What is lost is an accurate representation of the victims, how they responded to the violence perpetrated against them, and ultimately, how they had to come to terms with the implementation of the “Final Solution.” Kaplan's goal is to bring the lives of the Jewish victims back into focus, to remind us that they should be central in our study of the holocaust. She also seeks to remind us of the important role of Jewish women, who had to try and maintain some semblance of normalcy and sanity in the midst of extreme persecution. Kaplan reminds us that these women still had to get the children to school and get dinner on the table, all while their world was literally crumbling around them. Her narrative explains the sorrow and the horror the Jewish people endured in terms that are universal and easy for all of us to relate to: the context of home and family, husbands and wives, friends and neighbors.

In chapter one Kaplan outlines how the increased Nazification of Germany created severe economic and personal crises for the German-Jewish community. Unable to own businesses, or belong to professional organizations, many Jewish families lost their livelihoods. Kaplan also explains that while the Nazi laws became ever more restrictive, many “Aryan” businesses in the private sector made sure they were "ahead of the curve" when it came to eliminating Jews from the payroll or as customers. Because so many men lost their jobs and income, women willingly moved beyond the traditional confines of traditional roles and played a critical role in helping families survive economically. They were willing to be trained or re-trained and take almost any work available in order to replace their husband’s lost income. Many women were even willing to become apprentices to their own ‘help’ to make sure had a marketable trade that they could use in Germany or abroad. Kaplan also contends that women were far more aware of the changes that were occurring within German society. She suggests that since men were used to a certain level of competitiveness and aggression, they were not as attuned to the changes which occurred in their own neighborhoods. Women, on the other hand, were able to sense these changes at the grocer’s, at the post office, and even among their non-Jewish friends. Because they were more attuned to the increase in discrimination, Kaplan shows that they were far more likely to push for emigration than their husbands.

In her second chapter Kaplan further explains how women continued to expand their spheres of influence and to increase their responsibilities. She explains how they learned languages to prepare for emigration and enrolled in training classes to enable them to find work outside the home. They were also called upon to continue to maintain the stability of the home by making due with less and providing a "safe haven" in the midst of difficult times. Kaplan also revisits the many reasons why women were such a driving force behind emigration. Husbands, she contends, felt they couldn't afford to leave their business interests and their livelihoods, women had no such ties to the economy. Kaplan explains that many women were more attuned to the growing hostility than their husbands were, precisely because they were use gaining information from, what men considered, "unusual" sources, such as their own domestic help, neighbors, and through their own experiences on the street and while running errands. It also appears that women were forced to repress much of their fear and anxiety as a coping mechanism - almost out of necessity in order to maintain their sanity and their ability to deal with such extreme circumstances. Even when some women did convince their husbands that it was time to leave Germany, Jews faced an ever-growing list of obstacles. From the "Reich Flight Tax to foreign nations who closed immigration suddenly, Jews had to be ready to change plans, begin from scratch and even start learning yet another new language at a moments notice.

Kaplan outlines the unique stresses and obstacles faced by "mixed" families in Nazi Germany. While "interracial" marriages often face difficulties and stressors that couples who share the same ethnic and religious backgrounds, the pressure exerted by the Nazis was sometimes insurmountable for some couples. In fact, the Nazis openly encouraged "Aryans" to divorce their "non-Aryan" partners and promised to allow them back into the "Aryan" fold. Those who did not divorce their Jewish partners, faced continued sanctions, and, in the case of women, were often regarded as little more than prostitutes. It wasn't only the government that was a source of uncertainty and pain, but also "Aryan" family members, according to Kaplan. She asserts that it was impossible to know whether one's in-laws would be supportive or would toe the party line. Often, they could justify their antisemitism, but maintain the notion that their particular family member was the exception. In addition, Kaplan noted that in instances where Jewish women were married to "Aryan" men, the decision whether to stay together or divorce was also a question of life or death. Jewish women who lost the "protection" of an "Aryan" husband were subject to deportation and ultimately death. While some men stood by their wives, Kaplan recounts the stories of several who divorced their partners, literally sentencing them to death.

Chapter four is a particularly difficult chapter to read. So many discussions of the Holocaust focus on the “final solution, the concentration camps, and on the wholesale dehumanization and murder of the Jews at places like Dachau. Kaplan, however, shines a light on the years before the mass deportations and helps us to understand (as if we could ever truly understand) the fear, anxiety, stress and helplessness that the Jews were subjected to before the "final solution." At no place is Kaplan's narrative more compelling than in her discussion of the impact of Nazi policies on children. Without the protection of parents and siblings, young children were exposed to taunts, physical violence and humiliation at the hands of both teachers and other students. They were segregated, forced to sit on special benches, forbidden from participating in class field trips and ostracized. Many children were forced to endure the promulgation of Nazi propaganda and listen to the rants of pseudo-science as their teachers taught "racial" sciences. They were reminded daily that they were not only different from, but less than the "aryan" children in their class. It is difficult to comprehend how people could become so consumed by animus or patriotism that they were willing to not only verbally abuse Jewish children, but were also willing to use the threat of violence by their peers. That any of these children found the strength to stand up to their tormentors is truly amazing.

Jewish life in Nazi Germany hinged on the events that took place on November 9 and 10 of 1938. Before Kristallnacht, German Jews may have hoped that things would change, that Nazi policies would be met with resistance by non-Jews, or that the Nazis might even be overthrown. It’s appropriate that in Kaplan’s book, her chapter, “The November Pogrom and its Aftermath” comes near the middle of her narrative. Life in Nazi Germany would only become progressively worse and more hostile, and any hopes that Jewish families had to “ride out the storm” were dashed. But the events of Kristallnacht did something else according to Kaplan, they moved the violence of anti-Semitism from the realm of the streets to the privacy of one’s own home. Mobs pushed their way into Jewish homes and emptied china cabinets, dresser drawers, pantries and bookshelves. They tore up bedding and burned books. Home was no longer a refuge from the growing restrictiveness of the world outside, Jewish families lost that last bastion of security. Kaplan states that, “The image of flying feathers is one of a domestic scene gravely disturbed. This was women's primary experience of the November Pogrom. The marauders beat and arrested men. Although some women were publicly humiliated, bloodied, beaten, and murdered, most were forced to stand by and watch their homes torn apart and their men abused (126).”

As Kaplan continues her narrative, we see how the lives of those Jews who were unable to emigrate became increasingly constricted. The Nazis had succeeded in completely isolating Jews and un-assimilating them. By forcing them to wear the yellow star it was now impossible for them to assume to attempt to “blend in.” They were forbidden most healthy food items, forbidden to shop at most stores – and even then allowed to only shop at certain times of the day. They were forced to work as slave labor for companies like Mercedes-Benz and Siemans. Jewish converts to Christianity were forced to sit in segregated spaces banned from services altogether. They were forced out of their own homes and crowded together in apartments and then forced to move again and again into ever shrinking living spaces. The more they sought to emigrate, the more the Jewish people found their avenues blocked by a Nazi bureaucracy that sought to steal everything from them, and from a world-community that began to callously close its eyes and its doors. While Kaplan tells us that many sought to escape by living life “underground”, it was fraught with danger. Without identification papers Jewish men and women were unable to purchase food or obtain proper medical care and they were often at the mercy of a German citizenry whom they had no reason to trust.

All of these things occurred before the mass deportations to the concentration camps. The individuals who were crowded onto the railway cars for their final journey were a people that had been starved, abused, beaten, harassed, hounded and dehumanized. Many of them were elderly people whose children had managed to escape the Third Reich for Palestine or the United States, leaving them alone and lonely. As Kaplan reminds us, most were women (237). But they had once been schoolteachers, doctors, businessmen, professors, nurses and clerks. More importantly, they had once been someone’s neighbor or friend. All over Germany neighbor allowed neighbor to disappear without ever taking a stand. Friends chose to abandon their friends at their time of greatest need. Few offered any protest as they saw the suffering of the Jewish people increase.

I struggle with the German silence and have found myself asking: What would have happened if the German people had taken a stand in the early years of the Nazi regime? Could they have made a difference or ousted the Nazis if they had simply said ‘no’ to the politicization of race and the institutionalization of discrimination? As the power of the Nazis grew, resistance became more and more difficult, and most people simply closed their doors and pulled the blinds to avoid seeing anything they didn’t want to see. But it does not exonerate them. It does, however, force us to ask hard questions about how we ensure that something like the Holocaust does not occur again – even as we face the reality that we have allowed to happen again – in Rwanda, Darfur and Bosnia.

[Dan Stern · Rating 4 out of 5]

Missing in many Holocaust works are the experiences of common German Jews and what daily life for them became like after Hitler's rise to power in the early 1930s. One can read about the Nuremberg Laws or the November Pogrom but one can't get a real feel for how those laws impacted daily life except through memoirs and the testimony of common people. Marion Kaplan's book wonderfully fills the gap between history from the "top down" and history from the "bottom up."
This book makes you realize that stories of hiding and rescue weren't just an occasional thing that's celebrated by Hollywood in such things as Schindler's List, but they happend every day. Kaplan also makes it clear the incredible courage involved in hiding and also the courage of others who hid Jews during Hitler's reign of terror. One bone of contention among historians many times is also how popular were the anti-Semitic measures, with many historians asserting that the population at large really wasn't that bad. Kaplan's book destroys any myths that the German popluation didn't overwhelmingly approve of Hitler's anti-Semitic measures, even if they perhaps didn't see the conclusion of them coming in the "Final Solution." If a German didn't know about the anti-Semitic measures it's only because they willingly didn't pay attention or tried to delude themselves.
One interesting part that Kaplan writes about are the Jews who collaborated with the Nazis in cities as "Jew Hunters," including one Jewish woman who led the Gestapo to over 60 hidden Jews in a single day. Reading stories such as this, perhaps Hannah Arendt's frightening conclusion wasn't so far off in that without the help of the Jews many more could have been saved.
The one drawback to this book is that Kaplan focuses on memoirs and testimony exclusively from women and assumes much about the male Jewish population. This could have been a much better book if she had included memoirs from a wider selection of men rather than constantly referring to Klemperer's book

[Margaret Reynolds · Rating 3 out of 5]

Marion A. Kaplan's purpose for writing Between Dignity and Despair was to inform the public about the average Jewish person's life in Nazi Germany. She tells stories of daily events in Jewish life. For example, she writes of Elizabeth Bab getting evicted from her apartment for her religion. The landlady said she "found an Aryan doctor who seemed more secure as a tenant than a Jewish writer." She writes about the prejudices they had to face in every day life.

The theme of this book is based around equality. She talks about all of the injustices that were forced upon Jews and how equality didn't really exist. The author sends the message that she is fairly disgusted by the inequality, and rightly so.

The style of this book, personally, was not effective. It is a true description of what happened during Jewish life in Nazi Germany, but the way it was written did not seem to work for me. The whole time I was reading it felt like I was reading a very long essay instead of a book of experiences which is something I would have been more interested in.

Overall, this was not my favorite book. I liked learning about the experiences and hearing stories of daily life struggles. I disliked the way it was written. It felt like a high school essay rather than a well rounded book. When the author told some stories, there would be no names involved, which maybe they couldn't find the information they needed, but it didn't feel complete to me. I would change some of the aspects of how it was written. I would like to see it more well rounded. This is not similar to any other book I've read. All the books about the Holocaust that I've read have been one persons story, this told me about the overall population in Germany.

[Micebyliz]

i have long wanted to know more about women's roles during this time, so i was glad to find this book. It's good to know how strong many of these women were, how they stepped up to the plate and did what they felt needed to be done to survive and how they coped with unbearable decisions, the kind where you make a decision of the few for the many.
i am proud to be a descendant of this heritage.

[Sarah Laurence · Rating 5 out of 5]

I strongly recommend this prize-winning history book to everyone and wish I could give it an extra star. The author, an NYU professor of Modern Jewish History, filled the academic laguna on Holocaust history by focusing on the experience of Jewish women, who were disproportionately murdered in Nazi Germany. Although this book is academically rigorous, it was written in an accessible style and is only 237 pages. The author describes the history but uses engaging personal stories to illustrate the range of experiences. The content is of course disturbing, but important to read and to remember.

I read Between Dignity and Despair after enjoying Kaplan's Dominican Haven to research my WIP, a novel about Jewish refugees in the Dominican Republic during WWII. I now understand the Germany my female protagonist fled, and her luck at being able to escape a worse fate. I will consider the family she left behind.

[Celeste Valladares · Rating 5 out of 5]

The author draws upon hundreds if not thousands of memoirs diaries letters and accounts to provide a haunting and honest perspective on the daily life of Jews in Germany during the Nazi regime, emphasizing the role of gender & how it affected everything from ability and determination to emigrate, to the ways in which they chose to cope within the new norms. Difficult to read at times, however I find myself continuing because it seems only fair to bear witness, at least by reading, to the unimaginable pain these people endured in life.

[Katie Applebaum · Rating 5 out of 5]

Between Dignity and Despair - so eye-opening. Kaplan's novel documents the lived experiences of German Jews before, during, and after the Holocaust. Personally, I feel as though the Holocaust has almost become normalized in today's society - I mean, the amount of "jokes" I've seen with the mass destruction of Jewish life as the punchline is truly too numerous to recount. This was such a sobering, important, and (paradoxically) heartening book to read, and I would recommend the story to EVERYONE, not just my fellow history nerds.

[grace elston · Rating 4 out of 5]

The gendered perspective on the experience of the Jewish people in Nazi Germany gives agency to Jewish women as a group long overlooked by popular historiography. Kaplan as an engaging storyteller using the diaries and memoirs of these women tells a fuller and more nuanced story of Jewish daily life in the “Third Reich”. Her source base is rich and illustrative of the personal anxieties, torment, and violence experienced by Jewish peoples. Not only is this book an enjoyable read, unlike many other historiographical works, but its content is a cohesive and compelling story of the Holocaust with an emphasis on gender as her lens of focus.

[Jordan Tomasi · Rating 5 out of 5]

Gives a different perspective than you usually get with historical information from this period. The view of gender differences in particular was fascinating.

It also was good for reflection on how history really does repeat itself. The treatment of Jewish people had a lot of parallels to the treatment of Black people in the civil rights movement.

Very well written, and uses a tremendous amount of references to help give a better, and more Jewish, viewpoint of WWII and what was happening within the country and its society.

[K. Lang-Slattery · Rating 5 out of 5]

An excellent book backed by intense research. Kaplan includes countless details and background that shed light on the daily lives of Jews, and especially Jewish women and children, living in Germany between 1933 and 1945. It has been invaluable for me as I work on a new novel manuscript. Easy to read for anyone interested in how the Nazi government affected Jewish lives on a day to day basis. Thank you to Marion Kaplan for an important book.

[Eleni · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a well researched and detailed account of the horrors Jewish people suffered in Nazi Germany. The book examines their daily lives, the rapid deterioration of their circumstances, the deprivations, their cruel social alienation and ultimate physical annihilation. There is particular focus on the women's experiences and role in navigating those harrowing times.

[Laura · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book was really interesting because it gave a bit of a different perspective on the holocaust. I enjoyed reading and learning about the experiences of Jewish women and children, and the different gender roles for Germans and Jews.

[Rachel · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was looking forward to reading this. The premise interested me as it focused on women's point of view.
Unfortunately, the edition I had was very difficult to read- small print that constantly changed size. Perhaps I'll find this in a kindle edition and try again

[Mason Lawrence · Rating 4 out of 5]

Lots of valuable information I'd never heard before about how the Holocaust affected the lives of Jews and others Nazi Germany targeted. Somewhat dense and repetitive at times, but still enjoyable read.

[leighton · Rating 4 out of 5]

not only a very good overarching history of Jewish life in Nazi Germany, but Kaplan did an incredible job at inserting women's history but by highlighting that women's history IS history, it didn't happen outside the realm of the History. great book, very heartbreaking.

[Lola · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very interesting book showing the perspective of Jewish women before and during the Holocaust. It's easy to read, and the book presents different stories, showing the horrors faced by Jews in Europe.
Highly recommend.

[R · Rating 3 out of 5]

The tragic telling of German Jews in Nazi Germany starting in the 1930's through the end of the war from a female vantage point.

[Rob · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is 20 years old, and it appears that few have read it. You should read it.

[Jack Feldman · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book provides insight into the lives of Jewish people in Nazi Germany. Kaplan focuses specifically on memoirs of Jewish women living in Nazi Germany.

[M · Rating 2 out of 5]

An informative history of Jewish lives within Nazi Germany.

[Cathy Wacksman · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is like a doctoral thesis filled with statistics but is well worth reading to get an idea of how German Jews lived during the Holocaust. It emphasizes the role of Jewish women.

[Darcy Schock]

A very factual read about life for Jews in Germany during Nazi reign. I learned a lot about the progression of persecution in the 1930’s.

[Ada · Rating 3 out of 5]

Jewish women >>>

[Grant Topjon · Rating 5 out of 5]

No review.

[Cassidy · Rating 5 out of 5]

An enthralling and educational look at the rise of Nazism in Germany. Pulls from a plethora of first hand accounts — many of which are from German women — that illustrate how subtle the societal changes were to begin with, and how often many Jews (and the outside world) to wrote them off. Of course, this didn’t stay the case…as the book illustrates, the discrimination and danger Jews faced became exponential. But in much more complicating ways than is often depicted, and forms of violence became far more nuanced in terms of individual experience and identity. For anyone trying to understand even the tip of the Holocaust, this is a good place to begin.

[Xavier Frappier · Rating 4 out of 5]

Between Dignity and Despair by Marion A. Kaplan is a book about the Jewish people and how they survived in various ways when the Nazi party came to power. The author's purpose in this book was to explain and show the reader how the Jewish people had to change to survive in World War 2 and some of the events leading up to it. This book also shows the reader how war can change the roles of people. For example Jewish women were discriminated against more so they were more eager to face uncertainties if it meant living a better life. Women also had to assume more responsibility because people were being taken away so they had to do more jobs they traditionally would not in this time period, like selling homes on their own or deciding on a country to try to escape to, because there was no other choice. They were alone in a world that was tearing itself apart, so they took on greater responsibilities.
This book says a lot about equality and how it didn’t really exist. The Jews became scapegoats for the Germans, because the Germans were scared, in debt, and had just lost a major war. A good example of for equality didn’t exist is on page 14 it says “The Nazis had pledged to pursue more aggressive foreign policy aims, to counter ‘Jewish influence’”. This shows how the Jewish people were already discriminated against and yet the war hadn't even started yet.
In Between Dignity and Despair the author seems slightly disgusted by the Nazi party and how they discriminated against and killed the Jewish people. Mrs. Kaplan is very formal through out the book but with some of her wording it can sound passionate, like when she talks about the “ghettoization, forced labor, deportation, and ultimately the atrocities of the ‘ Final Solution of the Jewish Question’” on page 4. Mrs. Kaplan seems to be masterful in displaying emotions in her writing while letting you form your own opinions.
Altogether Between Dignity and Despair was an excellent read, and I highly recommend it. The book gave much insight into the life of a Jew while World War Two was happening. Personally it was a tad hard to read because like in all books it can get boring, but it is worth the read slight boredom at times. This book is like no other I have read, and you should check it out!