Can I read Holocaust Testimonies : the Ruins of Memory on EtoBox?

Holocaust Testimonies : the Ruins of Memory by Langer, Lawrence L. is a history book available to read on EtoBox.

What is Holocaust Testimonies : the Ruins of Memory about?

Winner of the 1991 National Book Critics Circle Award in Criticism This important an original book is the first sustained analysis of the unique ways in which oral testimony of survivors contributes to our understanding of the Holocaust. It also sheds light on the forms and functions of memory as victims relive devastating experiences of pain, humiliation, and loss. Drawing on the Fortunoff Video Archives for Holocaust Testimonies at Yale University, Lawrence L. Langer shows how oral Holocaust testimonies complement historical studies by enabling us to confront the human dimensions of the catastrophe. Quoting extensively from these interviews, Langer develops a technique for interpreting them as we might a written text. He contrasts written and oral narratives, noting that while survivor memoirs by authors such as Primo Levi and Charlotte Delbo transform reality through style, imagery, chronology, or a coherent moral vision, oral testimonies resist these organizing impulses and allow instead a kind of unshielded truth to emerge, just as powerful in its impact as the visions taking shape in written memoirs. He argues that it is necessary to deromanticize the survival experience and

Who reads Holocaust Testimonies : the Ruins of Memory?

Author

Langer, Lawrence L.

Publisher

New Haven : Yale University Press

Published

1991

Language

EN

ISBN

9780300052473

Category

history

Subjects

Fiction, Religion, Sociology

Rating

4 / 5 (57 ratings)

Updated

2026-03-14