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Stones From The Riverby Ursula Hegi |
Debbie Weiss: I am not even sure how I ended up with this book on my bookshelf, but I picked it up when I did not have a new book to read. What a pleasant surprise!
This is a very special book, written about the times and activities that took place in Germany between the two World Wars. The main character is Trudi, a "zwerg" or midget, who has suffered with being different and not being accepted throughout her entire life. Her mother died when Trudi was just three years old, after battling a roller coaster of emotional difficulties. Trudi was raised, therefore, by her father who returned from WWI as a disabled vet and who ran the town's pay library. The citizens of the town would always visit the library to borrow books and to listen to all the stories of Trudi, the local gossip and story-teller. Many of the women in the area would come to flirt with Trudi's father while their husbands were away at war.
As Hitler's regime started to take over, the people of town became divided by their beliefs and by their allegiances to the pro-Nazi government. Prior to Hitler, Jews and non-Jews lived together in a comfortable and peaceful coexistence, but that started to come apart as the regime began to blame Jews for all the problems in the country. First the businesses of the Jews were destroyed and then the Jews were arrested and ultimately sent to work camps.
Trudi and her father were despondent over the direction that their country was taking. They were distraught over the treatment of their good Jewish friends. They ended up hiding Jews in their home, risking their own lives, because it was the right thing to do.
This novel had a story on two levels, but really the messages were one and the same. First there was Trudi's story, one of feeling different and left out while growing up. She was always loved by her father, but wondered if her mother's mental illness had been caused by seeing her child born a "zwerg." Children were particularly cruel to this young girl and true friends were far and few between. People had a tendency to always discount Trudi's feelings and to treat her as a child.
On a higher level, there was the story of human beings being led to believe that certain humans were "different" and therefore inferior to other humans. Jew were the ones who were different and they were the ones who suffered terribly, often with their lives, due to this difference.
It was very interesting for me to read about this time in history
from a non-Jewish German's perspective. Not all Germans were
horrific, and we often forget those "heroes" that existed during those
extreme times. I would definitely recommend this book.
Rating: *****
