The Holocaust in art and literature

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As one of the defining events of the 20th century, and one of the most stark examples of human brutality in modern history, the Holocaust has had a profound impact on art and literature over the past 60 years.

Contents

1 Literature
2 Poetry
3 Film
4 Music
5 See also
6 External links

Literature

Some of the more famous works are by Holocaust survivors or victims, such as Elie Wiesel, Primo Levi, Imre Kertész, and Anne Frank, but there is a substantial body of literature and art in many languages. The Holocaust has been a common subject in American literature, with authors ranging from Sylvia Plath to Saul Bellow addressing it in their works.

In 1991, Art Spiegelman completed the second and final installment of his Pulitzer Prize winning graphic novel, Maus. Through text and illustration, the autobiography retraces his father's steps through the Holocaust along with the residual effects of those events a generation later.

White Wolf, Inc. put out Charnal Houses of Europe: The Shoah in 1997 under its adult Black Dog Game Factory label. It is a carefully researched, respectful, and horrifically detailed supplement on the ghosts of the victims of the Holocaust for the game line.

Key works in other languages include Ukrainian Anatoly Kuznetsov's novel about the Babi Yar massacre.

Some alternate history fiction set in scenarios where Nazi Germany wins WWII, includes the Holocaust happening in countries where it did not happen in reality.

Poetry

German philopsopher Theodor Adorno famously commented that "writing poetry after Auschwitz is barbaric," but there are some substantial works dealing with the Holocaust and its aftermath.

Film

The Holocaust has also been the subject of many films, including Oscar winners Schindler's List, Voyage of the Damned, The Pianist and Life is Beautiful. A list of hundreds of Holocaust movies is available at the [University of South Florida].

With the aging population of Holocaust survivors, there has also been increasing attention in recent years to preserving the memory of the Holocaust through documentaries.

Music

The massacre of Jews at Babi Yar inspired a poem written by a Russian poet Yevgeny Yevtushenko which was set to music by Dmitri Shostakovich in his Symphony No. 13.

In 1984, Canadian rock band Rush recorded the song Red Sector A on the album Grace Under Pressure. The song is particularly notable for its allusions to The Holocaust, inspired by Geddy Lee's memories of his mother's stories [link] about the liberation of Bergen-Belsen, where she was held prisoner.

In Pink Floyd's album The Wall , one of the record's tracks is titled "Waiting For The Worms". This song is set in the middle of the time the main character, Pink, has become a neo-nazi, and the head of a fascist group. The song seems to be set in a march down a main street in Brixton, England, with Pink singing/saying the lyrics through a megaphone. One of the lyrics from the song is, "Waiting! For the final solution to strengthen the strain!"

External links

[Inmate Art from Concentration Camps and Gettos: Expressing the Inexpressible] from
[Music of the Holocaust] from Holocaust Survivors' Network -- iSurvived.org
[Holocaust Literature] from Holocaust Survivors' Network -- iSurvived.org
[Basic bibliography of the Holocaust]
[Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies: Artist Gallery]
[Art and the Holocaust] from University of Pennsylvania