Overview

All but My Life is the basis for the Academy Award-winning documentary from HBO, One Survivor Remembers. This is the unforgettable story of Gerda Weissmann Klein's six-year ordeal as a victim of Nazi cruelty. From her comfortable home in Bielitz, Poland, to her miraculous survival and her liberation by American troops-including the man who was to become her husband-in Volary, Czechoslovakia, Gerda takes us on a terrifying journey. Gerda's serene and idyllic childhood is shattered when Nazis march into Poland on September 3, 1939. Although the Weissmanns were permitted to live for a while in the basement of their home, they were eventually separated and sent to German labor camps. Over the next few years, Gerda experienced the slow, inexorable stripping away of all but her life. By the end of the war she had lost her parents, brother, home, possessions, and community; even the dear friends she made in the labor camps, with whom she had shared so many hardships, were dead. Despite her horrifying experiences, Klein conveys great strength of spirit and faith in humanity. In the darkness of the camps, Gerda and her young friends manage to create a community of friendship and love. Although stripped of the essence of life, they were able to survive the barbarity of their captors. Gerda's beautifully written story gives an invaluable message to everyone. It introduces them to last century's terrible history of devastation and prejudice yet offers them hope that the effects of hatred can be overcome.

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9781441767233

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Soul-searching and human...A moving personal testament to courage. -- New York Times Gerda Weissmann Klein moves you, and not just because the story she can tell is so horrific. It is the passion with which she looked through the horror and found a heart-felt and basic goodness in humanity. -- Boston Globe An unforgettable reading experience...All but My Life is one of the most beautifully written human documents I have ever read. In this respect it is as sensitive and 'disturbing' a story as is The Diary of Anne Frank. -- Library Journal

An unforgettable reading experience...All but My Life is one of the most beautifully written human documents I have ever read. In this respect it is as sensitive and 'disturbing' a story as is The Diary of Anne Frank. -- Library Journal Gerda Weissmann Klein moves you, and not just because the story she can tell is so horrific. It is the passion with which she looked through the horror and found a heart-felt and basic goodness in humanity. -- Boston Globe Soul-searching and human...A moving personal testament to courage. -- New York Times

Author Information

Gerda Weissmann Klein was born in Bielsko, Poland, in 1924, and now lives in Arizona. Her husband, Kurt Klein, as a US Army lieutenant liberated Weissmann on May 7, 1945. The author of five books, she has received many awards and honorary degrees and has lectured throughout the country for the past forty-five years. Kurt and Gerda are the authors of The Hours After: Letters of Love and Longing in War's Aftermath. One Survivor Remembers, winner of an Emmy Award and the Academy Award for documentary short subject, was based on All but My Life. Grace Conlin (1962-1997) was the recording name of Grainne Cassidy, an award-winning actress and acclaimed narrator. She was a member of the Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company in Washington, DC, and won a Helen Hayes Award in 1988 for her role in Woolly Mammoth's production of Savage in Limbo.

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