Survival

by Magda Herzberger

Book Overview

The Autobiography of a Young Woman Who Survived the Horrors of the Nazi Death Camps. Survival is an autobiography in which the author relates her experiences and her struggle to survive during her... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0976582112
• ISBN13: 9780976582113
• Release Date: April 2005
• Publisher: 1st World Library Incorporated
• Length: 392 Pages
• Weight: 1.30 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.9" x 6.1" x 9.1"

Customer Reviews

SURVIVAL by Magda Herzberger

"Survival" is chilling! The contents give grizly details of three Nazi prison camps.But Magda Herzberger's superb ability to pen her thoughts takes the reader throuh her journey of awe and wonderment that led to her hell-hole of nearly unsurvivable torture.And then she brings us back to the real world. When I read about Magda's background [ off a well connected family with above average attitudes to make a positive difference in their community],I mentally engaged in that same strength.The when I read how she was shoved into the brink of near insanity,I felt her deep dark pain,and at the same time,I appreciated her tender-hearted goodness throughout the book.I applaud the author's courage to spill her gut-wrenching experiences onto the printed page and show the reader how she maintained her God-loving dignity. Magda does not give a world-involved view of the war;she writes her daily account from the frame of a teenager.She places the reader within her,so we experience the pain of her flesh and the light of her soul.Her prose throughout the book captures additional heart-felt thoughts that give support to her storyline. I recommend his book for teenagers as well as adults.We can learn from Magda Herzberger;she doesn't live in a prison of unforgiveness;instead,she looks for life and lives it.I suggest we all take a thankful attitude for the air we breathe.

A must read for anyone who cares about the human spirit.

This is not just another book about a Holocaust surviver. It is a book that tears deep to your soul with the facts, feelings and emotions of one that is a true surviver in what many would consider a hopeless strugle. It is a must read for anyone from any ideology. Dr. Moshe Carmilly-Weinberger said it best when he stated that this book needed to be written. And, I would add, it needs to be read.

Deeply transformative. Ironically redemptive.

I am related to this author through marriage into the family and thought I knew what this book was about. As a reader I was unprepared for the emotional impact of Magda's writing from her perspective as an eighteen year old. Madga tells her story truthfully, without learned defense mechanisms to anesthesize her horror, without a philosophy arrived at through decades of living. The authenticity of her innocence comes through strongly in her thoughts and perceptions. Her descriptions are so objective that I felt I was there with her. I had no idea how gripping her story was for me until I reached the point of her being liberated from the concentration camp and found myself crying for an hour. I think now that this book is primarily about Magda, as a remarkable person. Of course she writes as a voice for victims of the Halocaust. It is clear that this is her mission. I felt that the deep spirituality that pemeates her writing can apply to all recorded monstrocities. Her book is not just an exceptionally well-written story but an experience that can heal.

A heartwrenching historical document

I just finished reading "Survival".A most profound,poignant,and heart wrenching story.And a most valuable chronicle of history. It took me 4 days to read the book.Ordinarily I can finish a book of that length in one day.The emotional impact I felt was overwhelming,so I could read only a few chapters at a time,closing the book with tears in my eyes. I am an avid reader of WWII history,having read most of the books on this subject from our local public library.I've seen the actual movies and pictures taken after the war of the death camps.I know a lot of the facts and was repulsed by the total inhumanity;but I am ashamed to say I didn't really feel any pain.This book gave an insight into the suffering of the Jews that I never got from any writings. This book should be required reading in every high school.

Survival by Magda Herzberger

Man's inhumanity to other human beings is forcefully delineated in Magda Herzberger's autobiographical account as a member of the Jewish community. She grew up a very happy child in a sheltered environment in Cluj, Romania, shielded by the deep love and contentment of a devoted family. This congenial atmosphere was totally shattered by Hitler's Nazi persecution of the Jews when Magda found herself as a teenager uprooted from her serene surroundings to be suddenly transported to the inhumane treatment that was prevalent in the notorious concentration camps of Europe. How Magda survived this harrowing ordeal keeps the reader spellbound throughout her entire story. Her deep abiding faith in an all-loving Supreme Being enabled Magda to pierce the darkness enveloping her and witness the emancipating light at the end of a long tunnel. Her subsequent accomplishments in poetry, prose and music attest to the indomitable spirit Magda possessed even as a child. Magda's life story is truly a "magnum opus", so aptly described in the Foreward by Dr. Moshe Carmilly-Weinberger who knew Magda as a teenager. In addition, her book is rich with excerpts from Jewish culture and customs. SURIVAL is both an historical document while at the same time it is a pulsatingly human interest story.