Читать книгу Facing the Lion - Simone Arnold-Liebster - Страница 8

INTRODUCTION

All over Europe people were getting ready. The fiftieth anniversary of liberation from Nazi terror was designated as a period of remembrance. The world would once again focus on the period often referred to as “the pit,” “hell,” “the age of terror,” or “the night.” The little group of survivors, eyewitnesses who had borne the purple triangle (the concentration camp uniform symbol for the Jehovah’s Witnesses) also had their own commemorations in Strasbourg and in Paris. They traveled to many French towns with an exhibition and told their story. And then came the flood of questions—questions about facts, but also inquiries about life, our lives—piercing investigations that pried my mental shutters open one by one. I felt like I had returned to my childhood. I became “the little one” again, with all her memories, feelings, joys, and fears. Questions shone the spotlight on my dreams and nightmares and made me relive it all. Everything was so vivid, so precise, that I could recall even the smallest details of when I faced the Nazi “Lion” of oppression.

More friends joined the chorus. “Write it all down, draw a portrait, fix your memories. Capture the events now, while there is still time.” Here is my story.