Kirjailijakuva
18+ teosta 380 jäsentä 16 arvostelua 1 Favorited

Tekijän teokset

De fotograaf van Auschwitz (2013) 41 kappaletta
The Auschwitz Photographer (2021) 39 kappaletta
A Menina de Kiev 1 kappale

Associated Works

Vampirismo (1821) — Kuvittaja, eräät painokset15 kappaletta

Merkitty avainsanalla

Yleistieto

Sukupuoli
male

Jäseniä

Kirja-arvosteluja

Independent Reading Level: Grades 2-4
Honors/Awards: N/A
 
Merkitty asiattomaksi
mkoch22103 | 5 muuta kirja-arvostelua | Nov 28, 2023 |
As with all books about the Holocaust this is a harrowing read. Brasse was a Pole with an Austrian father and grandfather who refused to serve in the German army - he was expected to assimilate because of his 'Aryan' blood - and was sent to Auschwitz as a political prisoner. At first, his chances of survival didn't look good, but he managed a transfer to the kitchens and then was co-opted into a unit to produce photographs - identity ones of the prisoners and photos for the Germans to send home to their families. After a while, he was ordered to take photos for the 'doctors' such as Mengele, to document their horrible experiments.

He gradually made contact with the resistance within the camp and helped in various ways, sometimes just to ensure that people who needed it got food but at other times to produce false papers for people. Always he had misgivings and qualms about his enforced collaboration, though he resisted the pressure from his captors to be classified as a German and go to fight for Germany.

I do note that certain people mentioned in the book as being part of the resistance were not part of Primo Levi's first person account of his survival in another of the subcamps of Auschwitz. The present book doesn't really explain that the camp was huge, like a city, and there were lots of enclaves and areas where the prisoners were working for particular German firms, for example. So a particular individual who somehow manages to be married in the camp but later comes to grief was not universally known there for his heroism: things seem to have been more 'local' than comes across in this book.

I do have an issue regarding the information provided which shows the book was not based on interviews with Brasse himself, but on talking to his children and also taking information from a BBC documentary. So the assumptions about his feelings are actually second-hand. The other problem is that it mentions that some events have been switched around to fit the narrative. That means it's not possible to rely on this as a totally factual account, because as a reader I don't know what liberties have been taken with the timeline and why. For these reasons, I can only give this three stars.
… (lisätietoja)
 
Merkitty asiattomaksi
kitsune_reader | 1 muu arvostelu | Nov 23, 2023 |
Wilhelm Brasse spent five years in Auschwitz and during those years he photographed over 50,000 prisoners. He was originally arrested and sent to the concentration camp for refusing to join the German army. While there he is put to work in the Identification Office where he takes photographs of all incoming prisoners for Nazi records. In time, as word of his talent travels the camp, he is required to take photos for camp officers. He is eventually summoned to take photos for camp doctors, including Dr. Joseph Mengle, and sees the atrocities his experiments actually were. Brasse saves thousands of photos when Auschwitz is liberated.

I had never heard of Wilhelm Brasse and was unaware that prisoners at Auschwitz were given positions such as photographers. I found the book interesting although there were some scenes that I felt were a little out of the norm for historical fiction. There were several descriptions of Mengle's "experiments" that I physically recoiled from. I do understand that these were events that happened but I felt they could have been handled differently. I also did not understand the abrupt ending to the story and do not understand why the authors would choose to end Wilhelm Brasse's story in such an odd way.
… (lisätietoja)
 
Merkitty asiattomaksi
Micareads | 1 muu arvostelu | Jun 21, 2022 |
In 1939, William Brasse, a young Pole, refuses to swear loyalty to hitler. In March 1940 he is captured and sent to Sanok, Tarnow and then to Auschwitz. Used as slave labor to demolish homes to make room for roadways, move corpses to crematorium, and kitchen work. In 1941, the political department assigns him to the identification photo studio.

Brasse worked here taking portrait photographs of political prisoners, Jewish prisoners, and captured resistance fighters virtually all to be tortured, starved, over-worked and killed within months. Brasse is determined to do whatever it takes to survive as long as he can. Because he learned photography as a teen from his uncle, excelled at it, and avoided being outside the studio more than absolutely necessary, he survives until January 1945 when he is marched to Ebensee Concentration Camp. Months later, in May, Ebensee is liberated by American soldiers.

He tried making his subjects as comfortable as possible under the circumstances. He was witness to some of the most egregious evil man could inflict on man. Ordered by Mengele and other doctors to photograph starved Jewish girls, girls on whom ‘medical’ experiments were done, usually twins as well as those with eyes of different colors, prisoners who developed open facial wounds exposing muscle and bone, young women who were sedated and had their uteruses removed, corpses who had organs removed, etc.

Brasse’s photography was perhaps too good. Nazi officers often asked him to take their portraits to send home to their families. At first Brasse couldn’t understand why the nazis would document their heinous crimes. Over time he realized many of them had been brainwashed into believing they were doing good work, ridding the world of ‘inferior races.'

During the last year of working in Auschwitz Brasse’s commitment to survive is overtaken by his need to bear witness. He carefully makes contact with resistance prisoners, providing photos and other documentation of what goes on in Auschwitz. He doesn’t want to die, of course, but if caught, he will know he’s done his best to let the outside world see the truth. And in an even more ambitious effort to preserve most of the 40,000 – 50,000 photographs he has taken, he aborts the order by his direct boss, Walter to burn all the photos. And blockades the studio so no one else can burn or destroy the photographs. He never sees or enters that photo studio again!

Book is very clear and well-written.

But… to me, a Jewess, I felt the authors kept the magnitude of the horror of Auschwitz to the margins of the story. Yes, we do ‘see’ Brasse experience terror and anxiety at what he had to photograph. And learn about what he sees outside his window; kapos beating prisoners to death, corpses piled up and being moved to the crematorium.

I still felt that the actual nightmare experience of Auschwitz (and all the concentration camps), from crowding civilians onto trains without food, water or sanitation, the torture, medical experiments, the mass murder of Jews, political prisoners, the Romani, homosexuals, the handicapped and mentally ill, the old, weak and sick, and anyone the nazis didn’t like was choreographed into the background so that Brasse and his life would be front and center.

And the reader doesn’t know for sure how Basse felt about Jews. He was horrified by the condition of the 4 emaciated Jewish twin girls, and some of the other Jewish subjects of medical experiments. But I don’t think he tried helping Jewish prisoners in any major way.
… (lisätietoja)
 
Merkitty asiattomaksi
Bookish59 | 2 muuta kirja-arvostelua | Feb 17, 2022 |

You May Also Like

Associated Authors

Lorenzo De Pretto Illustrator
Davide Corsi Illustrator
Flavio Ferron Cover artist
Wilhelm Brasse Associated Name

Tilastot

Teokset
18
Also by
1
Jäseniä
380
Suosituimmuussija
#63,551
Arvio (tähdet)
3.8
Kirja-arvosteluja
16
ISBN:t
61
Kielet
8
Kuinka monen suosikki
1

Taulukot ja kaaviot