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Diary of a Witness, 1940–1943
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Author
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Raymond-Raoul Lambert. Richard I. Cohen, ed. Isabel Best, trans.
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Publisher
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Ivan R. Dee
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Format
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hardcover
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Product Dimensions
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9
x
6
x
1
inches
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ISBN
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9781566637404
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Pages/Publication Date
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221/2007
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Daedalus Item Code
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21954
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This item is not available.
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Description
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Written between the German invasion of France in 1940 and his arrest in August 1943—after which he and his family were interred at Drancy and then sent to their deaths at Auschwitz—Raymond-Raoul Lambert's Diary is a heartbreaking yet essential testament from a leader of French Jewry in Vichy France. Lambert was the director of the General Union of the Jews of France (UGIF), and was, in the words of historian Michael Marrus, "arguably the most important Jewish official in contact with the Vichy government and the Germans." Judged by some as an unheroic bureaucrat who maintained careful relationships with his French and German overseers, Lambert reveals in his carefully worded diary that he was neither obedient nor honest with them in his efforts to save the Jews of France—particularly the children—and that he remained deeply divided in his loyalties as a Frenchman and a Jew. "A frank portrait of a rather unfortunate good Jew caught in the deadly net of the Nazi extermination machine."—Jerusalem Post "Lambert's struggle to reconcile his Jewish and French identities deserves to be included in the reservoir of suffering that was Nazi Europe.... His decisions have been, and will be, judged by history, but readers of this book will emerge with respect for his courage in wrestling with the idolatry of loyalty as the reality of the Vichy regime undermines the 'humane culture' of France."—Catholic News Service
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