The Diary of Samuel Golfard and the Holocaust in Galicia

By (author) Wendy Lower Claremont McKenna College

Publication date:

22 August 2011

Length of book:

198 pages

Publisher

AltaMira Press

Dimensions:

240x162mm
6x9"

ISBN-13: 9780759120785

The Diary of Samuel Golfard and the Holocaust in Galicia examines the contents and context of a rare diary written by a Jewish man from Nazi-occupied Poland. Serving as both a record and an artifact of Samuel Golfard’s life, the diary details his attempt to make sense of and resist the event that ultimately destroyed him. Wendy Lower integrates photographs, newspaper articles, documents, and testimonies to create a more complete picture of Golfard’s experiences and writings. She also traces the diary’s own journey after Golfard’s death, from 1943 Poland to the present day.

Preface
Acknowledgments
Editor’s Note

Part I: Introduction to Samuel Golfard's Diary
–Reading Jewish Diaries of the Holocaust
–The Golfard Diary as a Source of Holocaust History in Poland and Ukraine
–The Local Setting of Golfard’s Diary: Peremyshliany (Ukrainian), Przemyślany (Polish), Peremyshlany (German)
–Peremyshliany before the Nazi Occupation
–The German Occupation of Peremyshliany, 1941–1944

Part II: Samuel Golfard's Diary, January to April 1943

Part III: Related Documents
–Wartime Documents
–Postwar Documents
–Jacob Litman’s Testimonies
–Rescue in Peremyshliany : The Example of Tadeusz Jankiewicz and His Family

List of Documents
Place Names Mentioned in the Diary
Bibliography
Chronology of Events Related to the Diary
Biographies
Index
About the Author

This volume combines a powerfully emotional personal narrative with concise and cohesive historical analysis in a way that other source-based books do not. Moreover, it is of great use to both scholars and students. While specialists and historians will surely find Golfard’s testimony textually rich, multi-dimensional, and challenging, the educational value of this volume is substantial. The book is short enough for students to digest easily, and perhaps more important, the historical background and editorial comments make the text a stand-alone work containing all one needs to truly engage with Samuel Golfard’s diary. Lower has produced an accessible yet historically complex commentary on a very special testimony—one that scholars and educators alike will certainly want on their shelves.