Masha Rolnik
Masha Rolnik, a Yiddish and Russian writer, was the author of the most famous book in the world Ani Hayevet Lesaper (I Have to Tell). She was born in Klaipeda, Lithuania where her father was a lawyer. The family moved to Vilna in 1939 and a year later, Lithuania was annexed to the U.S.S.R. and invaded by Germany in 1941. Rolnik kept a diary of her experiences from the outbreak of war. She survived the Vilna Ghetto and two concentration camps and was finally liberated by the Soviets; her mother and two younger brothers were exterminated by the Nazis. Her diary was first published in Lithuania in 1963 and, in 1965 she translated it into Russian and Yiddish. Quite a few changes were made to her book by the Soviet censor but, nevertheless, it was a unique case of a survivor's diary being officially published in the Soviet Union. Masha Rolnik lived in Leningrad from 1964. She wrote many books and essays, all of which dealt with one topic: the Holocaust. She died in Leningrad in 2016.
I Have to Tell is more than just a diary. It is the stream of consciousness of a young girl from 1941-1945, beginning a month before her 14th birthday and lasting the 3 years and 7 months of the German occupation. Her first memory is the Vilna Ghetto. She then saw her mother, sister and brothers taken to the death camp at Ponary to be exterminated while she was sent to Kaiserwald and Strassenhof concentration camps near Riga, Latvia. From there she was transported to Shtutthof death camp near Gdansk, Poland until she was liberated by the Red Army. This book is a living testimony to the horrendous and cruel acts of the Nazi regime in their efforts to exterminate the Jews of Lithuania as viewed through the eyes of an innocent young girl.
From: Wikipedia
Contact us:
Our Facebook
