As I mentioned here, I have a (severe) fascination with the history of the Holocaust and the transmission of its memory into contemporary politics and culture. Sunday 27th January was the UK’s Holocaust Memorial Day - a time to reflect on the Holocaust itself, and to commemorate other genocides around the world. For those interested, the 27th of January is the anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz.
The BBC commissioned a documentary to mark the day, which I heard about via Radio 4. Henia Bryer, a survivor of four separate concentration camps, including Auschwitz, spoke to John Humphrys of the Today Programme. She explained that she wanted to keep her Holocaust tattoo “as a witness” to what she had suffered. With my brain full of Holocaust denial-related stuff, it was a must-see. (You can listen to the specific interview here)
One of the first things I noticed was the dedication at the beginning, which read “For Henia, from her niece Lisa.” Turns out her niece directed and produced it. The film is all about hers and her family’s survival, and it was made all the more real in that it was directed by a family member. It also became clear that Henia was not one to talk about her experiences and her suffering, and neither were her family. To this day, Henia does not know what her brother did during the war when they were separated. The documentary seemed to be portrayed as a gift, somewhere that Henia could express that episode of her life.
It is different, in my mind, from some other Holocaust documentaries. In purely aesthetic terms, there is a lot of archive material that I have personally never seen before, which considering the subject topic, can be interesting and revolting in equal measure. But, it was also very successful in concentrating solely on Henia’s experiences, and what she saw and felt throughout her time in the concentration camps. There was no ‘factual’ voice verifying her dialogue (aside from archive material) and she was simply just given her platform to speak. Apart from short additions by a couple of members of her family, it was only her voice. It was focused on short anecdotes that gave brief but pertinent insights into her experiences, an example of which is the day the officers came to her barracks to collect the prisoners to give blood. Because of the nature of their diets and the physical labour they were forced to do, those that gave blood (we're talking many pints) didn't survive long. She managed to survive, by convincing an officer that she had Typhus. A close shave.
With Holocaust denial an obvious influence in the way I interpreted this documentary, this focus on her personal and raw testimony is an important one. The personalisation of the Holocaust is important in its translation into history, and is a crucial focus in the generalised notion of the six million. Soon there will be no survivors to tell us their tales.
All in all, I thought it was a moving and sensitive documentary, one that really drove home the human and emotional implications of such a tragic historical events. After the war, Henia found her mother in Germany, and moved to Paris with her uncle in an attempt to rebuild their lives. They made it to Israel, where she managed to find her brother. She met her husband there and emigrated with him to South Africa, where she has had a happy and fulfilled life She has so much dignity and so little anger, and tells her story in such a matter-of-fact way. An inspiring watch.
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| Henia after the war |
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