March 5, 2012
Contact Rick Kyte at
608-796-3704 or rlkyte@viterbo.edu
HOLOCAUST SURVIVOR PETER FEIGL AND SALVAGED PAGES: STORIES FROM HOLOCAUST
DIARIES AUTHOR ALEXANDRA ZAPRUDER TO SPEAK AT VITERBO UNIVERSITY MARCH 22
LA
CROSSE, Wis. – Holocaust survivor Peter Feigl and Salvaged Pages: Stories from Holocaust Diaries author Alexandra
Zapruder will speak at 7 p.m. Thursday, March 22 in the Viterbo University Fine
Arts Center Main Theatre.
Winner
of the National Jewish Book Award in the Holocaust category, Salvaged Pages: Stories from Holocaust
Diaries is a collection of diaries, including Feigl’s, written by young
people during the Holocaust. The book contains extensive excerpts from diaries,
10 of which had never been translated or published in English. Some of the
diarists survived the Holocaust, but most perished. Feigl is the only one still
alive.
Feigl
was 13 years old when he began keeping a diary. Born in Germany, Feigl fled
with his family to Vienna, then Brussels, and finally Vichy France to escape
the Nazis. The son of secular Jewish parents, Feigl was baptized a Catholic in
1937 in an effort to avoid persecution. He was still racially identified as a
Jew by the Nazis. In 1942, the government of Vichy France began to round up
Jews for deportation. His parents sent him to a Catholic summer camp to obscure
his Jewish ancestry. His parents were arrested and sent to Auschwitz where they
were killed.
Feigl
would eventually be sent to Le Chambon, a French village that took in and helped
thousands of Jewish refugees. On May 22, 1944, Feigl crossed the French border
into Switzerland, where in his words, “Then I sleep soundly in a free country.”
He would share his story in his book, One
Man, Two Voices: Peter Feigl’s Diary and Testimony.
Zapruder
began her career as a member of the founding staff of the United States
Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C. She is also the author of Nazi Ideology and The Holocaust, which was
used by educators across the country. Her documentary film for young audiences,
I’m Still Here, based on her book Salvaged Pages: Stories from Holocaust
Diaries, was broadcast on MTV in 2005.
This presentation is part of the D.B. Reinhart Institute for Ethics in
Leadership’s Spring Lecture Series and is being held in conjunction with
Viterbo’s annual Teaching the Holocaust Workshop for educators. For a complete schedule, visit www.viterbo.edu/ethics.
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