Tak for Alt

Judith Meisel was about 12-years-old when World War II engulfed Europe. Living with her mother and her siblings in Lithuania when the country was invaded by the Russians, and then by the Germans, the Meisels, being Jewish, soon found themselves forcibly relocated to the Kovno Ghetto. Later, the family was shipped to the Stutthof concentration camp in Poland, where Judith's mother was murdered and Judith and her sister, Rachel, were separated from their brother. When the Stutthof camp was closed and the prisoners were being moved to another camp, Judith and Rachel escaped during the confusion caused by an air raid, managing to pass as Catholic until the war's end, ultimately finding a haven in Denmark. In Tak for Alt, Judith Meisel adds her unique story to the litany of first-person accounts of the Holocaust, narrating her terrible experiences with terrific clarity, recalling those who harmed as well as those who helped (particularly the Danish people) her and her sister, and in so doing showing us both sides of human nature in vivid detail. A well-edited oral documentary, featuring an engaging woman who is very much the gentle, white-haired, grandmother type (with a very disturbing bedtime story), this is highly recommended. Editor's Choice. Aud: H, C, P. (P. Van Vleck)