Jakob Lothe

Female Time Witnesses. Stories From the Holocaust

Kvinnelige tidsvitner. Fortellinger fra Holocaust

“If we had observed a minute of silence for each of the six million Jews that were murdered, we would have stood still for twelve years.”

The quotation comes from the 87 year old Blanche Major. In Female Time Witnesses. Stories from the Holocaust, Major and nine other Jewish women talk about their horrifying experiences from Auschwitz, Theresienstadt, Bergen-Belsen and other Nazi concentration camps.
Surrounded by soldiers, dogs and electric fences, the young girls had one goal in common: to survive. In this book they tell about the humiliation, hunger and despair they experienced. But here are also stories of dignity, solidarity and hope. Each fate is unique, but taken together they display an unbreakable will to live and an astonishing lack of bitter feelings.
Female Time Witnesses is a book that tells the story about what happened and what must never happen again.

Bok 589

‘These eyes have seen things no one should have to see. These are eyes that belong to ten women who demonstrate great courage in telling their stories, and who live on — despite all the evil and suffering they have been witness to.’

Aftenposten

‘The stories of these women, and the sober way they are penned by Jakob Lothe, constitute an important, attitude-forming piece of work.’

Morgenbladet
Forfatter 589
Photo: Øyvind Toft

Jakob Lothe is a writer, a literary scholar and Professor of English Literature at The University of Oslo.
Lothe has written a number of important publications, including Time Witnesses. Stories from Auschwitz and Sachsenhausen (2006). It was elected Book of the year by the Norwegian newspaper Morgenbladet’s readers.