Overview

Hungarian Jews, the last major Jewish community in the Nazi sphere of influence by 1944, constituted the single largest group of victims of Auschwitz-Birkenau. In Hungarian Jews in the Age of Genocide Ferenc Laczó draws on hundreds of scholarly articles, historical monographs, witness accounts as well as published memoirs to offer a pioneering exploration of how this prolific Jewish community responded to its exceptional drama and unprecedented tragedy. Analysing identity options, political discourses, historical narratives and cultural agendas during the local age of persecution as well as the varied interpretations of persecution and annihilation in their immediate aftermath, the monograph places the devastating story of Hungarian Jews at the dark heart of the European Jewish experience in the 20th century.

Full Product Details

Author:   Ferenc Laczó
Publisher:   Brill
Imprint:   Brill
Volume:   8
Dimensions:   Width: 15.50cm , Height: 1.80cm , Length: 23.50cm
Weight:   0.518kg
ISBN:  

9789004324640

ISBN 10:   900432464
Pages:   240
Publication Date:   15 September 2016
Audience:   Professional and scholarly ,  Professional & Vocational
Format:   Hardback
Publisher's Status:   Active
Availability:   In stock  
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Table of Contents

Acknowledgements Introduction Hungarian Jewry before and after the Holocaust Jewish Intellectual History and the Case of Hungary Themes and Sources Jewish Studies in the Horthy Era Identity Modern Traditions Values Contributions Historicity Conclusion Intellectual Agendas in the Shadow of Looming Catastrophe Conceptions of Jewish Culture From Creating to Saving Jewish Culture Political Discourses Narratives of Crisis Conclusion The Audible Voices of the Persecuted Hungarian Jewish Scholars and the Horthy Era A Contemporary History of Nazism Conclusion Articulating the Unprecedented The DEGOB Interview Protocols Remembering Buchenwald Annihilation and Death Camps Witnessing the Gas Chambers Conclusion Narrating Survival The Privileged among the Terrorized On the Devil’s Island, on Tortured Roads Diverging Fates Conclusion Documenting Responsibility Nazism as Falsified Genealogy The Profound Ambivalences of a Key Witness An Integrated History of the Holocaust in Hungary A Communist Panorama of the European Jewish Catastrophe Conclusion Conclusion Biographical Notes Bibliography Main Primary Sources Main Secondary Sources. Books Main Secondary Sources. Articles Index

Reviews

This is an innovative and extremely important study about a basically unexplored subject in the history of the Holocaust. It focuses on the rich variety of responses by Hungarian Jewish intellectuals to the catastrophe that befell Hungary's Jewry during the Nazi era. Based on extensive and meticulous research, Ferenc Laczo's study sheds light on one of the darkest eras in Hungarian and Hungarian-Jewish history. Randolph L. Braham, Distinguished Professor Emeritus, Graduate Center of the City University of New York Ferenc Laczo has not only filled an important gap in the history of the Holocaust in Hungary. With this methodologically innovative, highly original study, he reshapes our understanding of the ways in which Jews responded to their persecution before, during and after those terrible events. Dan Stone, Royal Holloway, University of London Ferenc Laczo has written a subtle and thorough intellectual history of Hungarian Jewish thought coming into and emerging out of the Second World War. It is a rare story in which people remain, but ideas change. He shows how the Holocaust cut across intellectual traditions, changing their course forever. Nonetheless, it is the ongoing presence of Hungarian Jews and the brief interlude of intense reflection following the war that forms the centerpiece of the book, and offers the strongest argument for why this case study matters. Holly Case, Cornell University

Ferenc Laczo's monograph is a groundbreaking study focused on Hungarian Jewish intellectuals from the interwar years, through the aftermath of the Second World War. He shows that Hungarian Jewish identity, although generally very Hungarian, was not nearly as monolithic as is often portrayed. Moreover, he shows that Jewish intellectuals engaged in diverse ways with the deteriorating situation of Hungarian Jewry and the unfolding Shoah. After the war their writings were important in setting the tone of public discourse for years to come. [...] This is a book that scholars and others who are interested in the Holocaust in general, and the Holocaust in Hungary in particular, should read. In tandem with Mary Gluck's excellent study which touches upon some of the issues L. addresses about Jewish self-understanding, but regarding an earlier period, we now have a pair of excellent scholarly sources for exploring diversity and change in Hungarian Jewish identity and self-understanding during a tumultuous period. Robert Rozett in Sehepunkte 18-10 (2018) For those who care about the Holocaust in Hungary, this book is an opportunity. In fact, if I had to choose only one book on the Holocaust of the Jews of Hungary, I would select this one because of its wide perspective. Brian Horowitz on H-Nationalism With eloquent language and nuanced argumentation, Laczo has collected a wealth of material about the Hungarian Holocaust and opened the door to the international community of Holocaust scholars, who are invited to explore, compare, and stand in awe of the depths of the material Hungarian Jews created in the immediate aftermath of the Holocaust. Ilse Josepha Lazaroms in East Central Europe The outcome is a meticulously researched and well contextualised study, which engages critically with both the Hungarian scholarship on Jewish studies and the international debates on Jewish history and the Holocaust. The book's refreshingly persuasive interpretation is based on Laczo's noteworthy ability to explain difficult and complex debates in an accessible language, without however diminishing their rich internal cultural dynamism and specific topoi. Marius Turda on H-SozKult [Laczo] tells a nuanced story of a community in crisis and provides an important corrective to the oversimplified picture historians often paint of unflaggingly assimilationist Hungarian Jews that refused to heed the warnings of the ever-increasing threats to their existence. Leslie M. Waters in Austrian History Yearbook This is an innovative and extremely important study about a basically unexplored subject in the history of the Holocaust. It focuses on the rich variety of responses by Hungarian Jewish intellectuals to the catastrophe that befell Hungary's Jewry during the Nazi era. Based on extensive and meticulous research, Ferenc Laczo's study sheds light on one of the darkest eras in Hungarian and Hungarian-Jewish history. Randolph L. Braham, Distinguished Professor Emeritus, Graduate Center of the City University of New York Ferenc Laczo has not only filled an important gap in the history of the Holocaust in Hungary. With this methodologically innovative, highly original study, he reshapes our understanding of the ways in which Jews responded to their persecution before, during and after those terrible events. Dan Stone, Royal Holloway, University of London Ferenc Laczo has written a subtle and thorough intellectual history of Hungarian Jewish thought coming into and emerging out of the Second World War. It is a rare story in which people remain, but ideas change. He shows how the Holocaust cut across intellectual traditions, changing their course forever. Nonetheless, it is the ongoing presence of Hungarian Jews and the brief interlude of intense reflection following the war that forms the centerpiece of the book, and offers the strongest argument for why this case study matters. Holly Case, Cornell University Reviews can be found online at the following locations: https://www.hsozkult.de/publicationreview/id/rezbuecher-27375 http://www.quest-cdecjournal.it/reviews.php?id=126 https://networks.h-net.org/node/3911/reviews/1706069/horowitz-lacz%C3%B3-hungarian-jews-age-genocide-intellectual-history-1929 https://www.zfo-online.de/index.php/zfo/article/view/13483/13225 https://ahea.pitt.edu/ojs/index.php/ahea/article/view/344 http://booksandjournals.brillonline.com/content/journals/10.1163/18763308-04501006 https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/austrian-history-yearbook/article/ferenc-laczo-hungarian-jews-in-the-age-of-genocide-an-intellectual-history-19291948-central-and-eastern-europe-8-leiden-brill-2016-pp-239/C199E330AB91CDF08060D687DC7AE5CC

For those who care about the Holocaust in Hungary, this book is an opportunity. In fact, if I had to choose only one book on the Holocaust of the Jews of Hungary, I would select this one because of its wide perspective. Brian Horowitz on H-Nationalism With eloquent language and nuanced argumentation, Laczo has collected a wealth of material about the Hungarian Holocaust and opened the door to the international community of Holocaust scholars, who are invited to explore, compare, and stand in awe of the depths of the material Hungarian Jews created in the immediate aftermath of the Holocaust. Ilse Josepha Lazaroms in East Central Europe The outcome is a meticulously researched and well contextualised study, which engages critically with both the Hungarian scholarship on Jewish studies and the international debates on Jewish history and the Holocaust. The book's refreshingly persuasive interpretation is based on Laczo's noteworthy ability to explain difficult and complex debates in an accessible language, without however diminishing their rich internal cultural dynamism and specific topoi. Marius Turda on H-SozKult [Laczo] tells a nuanced story of a community in crisis and provides an important corrective to the oversimplified picture historians often paint of unflaggingly assimilationist Hungarian Jews that refused to heed the warnings of the ever-increasing threats to their existence. Leslie M. Waters in Austrian History Yearbook This is an innovative and extremely important study about a basically unexplored subject in the history of the Holocaust. It focuses on the rich variety of responses by Hungarian Jewish intellectuals to the catastrophe that befell Hungary's Jewry during the Nazi era. Based on extensive and meticulous research, Ferenc Laczo's study sheds light on one of the darkest eras in Hungarian and Hungarian-Jewish history. Randolph L. Braham, Distinguished Professor Emeritus, Graduate Center of the City University of New York Ferenc Laczo has not only filled an important gap in the history of the Holocaust in Hungary. With this methodologically innovative, highly original study, he reshapes our understanding of the ways in which Jews responded to their persecution before, during and after those terrible events. Dan Stone, Royal Holloway, University of London Ferenc Laczo has written a subtle and thorough intellectual history of Hungarian Jewish thought coming into and emerging out of the Second World War. It is a rare story in which people remain, but ideas change. He shows how the Holocaust cut across intellectual traditions, changing their course forever. Nonetheless, it is the ongoing presence of Hungarian Jews and the brief interlude of intense reflection following the war that forms the centerpiece of the book, and offers the strongest argument for why this case study matters. Holly Case, Cornell University

Author Information

Ferenc Laczó, Ph.D. (2011), is Assistant Professor in contemporary European history at Maastricht University. He has published peer reviewed articles in Holocaust Studies, the Journal of Modern Jewish Studies, and the Leo Baeck Institute Yearbook.

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