The shelter of words: handmade diaries in Nazi camps

Huhák, Heléna (2024) The shelter of words: handmade diaries in Nazi camps. JOURNAL OF MODERN JEWISH STUDIES, 24 (1). ISSN 1472-5886

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Abstract

ABSTRACT This study presents the history of diary-making during the Holocaust. Based on hitherto less studied diaries from the Sömmerda forced labour camp, I examine the diaries as physical objects. I argue the camp diary is both a narrative and a material representation of the deportation. Moreover, the diary “not only” told the story of everyday life, but also shaped it. I seek to answer the question of what we can learn from an analysis of the diary not only in terms of its content but also in terms of its material, decoration, and handwriting. The circumstances in the forced labour camp and the factory, as well as the cultural background of the diary keepers, determined the processes of diary making and diary writing. The practices associated with the diary cannot be simplified to the concept of spiritual resistance, but rather seen as a complex phenomenon involving many different processes. The complex process of making and writing diaries reveals the linkage between the physical reality of camp life and the imaginations of forced labourers. The decoration of the covers reveals strategies of symbolic reunification of divided families expressed through and in objects.

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