Lament
As the German army invades his shtetl in Poland, young Moishe Kantorowitz decides to mentally record everything he sees. In this movingly descriptive and devastating portrayal of prewar Jewish life and its destruction during the Holocaust, Moishe bears witness to incomprehensible cruelties and to the lives and communities that are rapidly being wiped out all around him. Moishe’s entire family is murdered in Auschwitz-Birkenau, and Moishe, selected to live, endures brutal treatment and constant hunger, his survival now dependent on the whims of his overseers and small acts of generosity that bring him back from the brink of death. Moishe survives massacres, a ghetto, several concentration camps and a death march. As the only remaining member of his family, he is determined to rebuild his life and to follow his mother’s last instruction to him: to tell the story of how they lived and how they perished.
Introduction by Dr. Bożena Karwowska
- At a Glance
- Poland/Belarus
- Prewar Jewish life
- Pruzhany ghetto
- Auschwitz-Birkenau death camp
- Concentration camps
- Death march
- Displaced persons camps in Austria and Italy
- Arrived in Canada in 1948
- Adjusting to life in Canada
- Honorary degree from Memorial University of Newfoundland
564 pages, including index
- Recommended Ages
- 16+ More Information
- Language
- English
*Note: If you are affiliated with an educational institution in Canada, books can be ordered free of charge. For more information click here.
About the author
Moishe Kantorowitz (1923–2008) was born in the town of Shershev, Poland (now Šarašova, Belarus). After the Holocaust, he immigrated to Canada and became a farmer near Brockville, Ontario, for two years. There, Moishe met his wife, Ruth, and they moved Montreal, where Moishe ran a convenience store and deli. In 1956, Moishe and his family moved to St. John’s, Newfoundland, where he worked as a travelling salesman. Moishe was active in the Jewish community in St. John’s, and in 1995, he received an honorary degree from Memorial University of Newfoundland for his work in the field of Holocaust education.
They had all disappeared. They had disappeared, and with them, their screams, their cries and their lament. All that was left along the empty train was a frightening and deadly silence.