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 Customer Reviews
Gripping yet fantasitc read., 17 Dec 2008
Well i have always been interested in the holocaust ever since i went to visit Anne Frank's house as a 12 year old girl. It really moved me yet didn't fully understand what the holocaust really meant or what had happened, yet I never forgot and since that day in Amsterdam I have followed documentaries intently and read around the subject.
Last year i decided i wanted, and needed to visit Auschwitz and I feel this is something everyone should do. I believe all school children should be taught about what happened there and we should never forget.
Visiting Auschwitz was a surreal experience and i felt as though i was walking round the set of a Hollywood movie. It is so surreal and hard to believe what happened there. It is beyond human comprehension the horrors suffered there, just over 60 years ago. I throughly enjoyed the visit and I mean that in a purely informative way. The visit brought me to tears and stays with you. There is so much to take in I would like to go back.
I will eventually get to my point!....
This book is a gripping read and a must for anyone who is interested in a first hand account of what actually happened there. I felt like i was living the experience with them and couldn't put it down.
Highly recommended and if you are thinking about visiting Auschwitz it is definatley worth the visit, there is lots of information on trip advisor about the best way to do it. Hope this helps xx
Disappointing, 15 Jul 2008
Truly the worst holocaust testimony ever written.So many mistakes throughout the whole text.Two examples of which were when Mr Muller mentions the camp orchestra in Birkenau,there was none, it was in Auschwitz 1.He also quotes that Kramer was in Birkenau and had came from Auschwitz 2.Both are one and the same place But important errors like these were repeated in every chapter and the worry for me is that Holocaust deniers may pick up on these simple blunders.Mr Mullers over use of adjectives and repetition of statements at times resulted in the book bordering on being boring.It read more like a students written essay who wasnt fully informed ,rather than an actual Holocaust survivors memoirs.Ive read many more imformative Holocaust testimonies and even Mr Muller must have been disappointed with the finished article.I tend to believe that the foreword said it all.
ochmister, 06 Jun 2008
Simple, one of the best books I have ever read. Very sad, sometimes un believable. But believe, this really happened and should not be forgotton. My respect goes to the author.
An account by somebody who witnessed everything first hand., 16 May 2008
There have been countless books written about Hitlers Final solution mostly by historians and occasionally by eyewitness survivors.
You can read account after account of conditions in the final months leading to the Russians eventual entry into the camp but few books will be as informative as this one written by camp Sonderkommando Filip Muller whose actual job was to operate the crematoria and dispose of the thousands of corpses.
During the latter half of 1944 an incredible 10,000+ were liquidated on a daily basis.This may appear too far fetched to comprehend at first but when you realise that those in command from Hitler right down to Himmlers eventual realisation that the war was turning against them a dramatic escelation in gassing took place until mass shootings were the norm and corpses were burnt round the clock in open pits.
At the height of the liquidation Berkenhau had over ten ovens working night and day resulting in a massive escalation of gassings.In early 1944,10,000 prisoners were murdered every day and there were sufficient ovens to cope with the huge number of bodies.
Filip was there as all this was going on and later as the mass of bodies became too overwhelming to cope with it was the Sonderkommandos duty to remove the rotting corpses for disposal in the ovens.
There are certain passages that will really make one think momentarily on the question of mans inhumanity towards his fellow man.
The arrival and first trial of mass gassings where under extream brutality men women and children were forced to undress knowingly they were facing certain death.
Possibly the most heart rending extracts are to be found on page 48 where Filip having discovered the arrival of his father at the camp has to cremate his body after his death from tythus.Fellow workmen working alongside him at the blazing ovens recite a prayer.
The book really brings the true barbarity of camp life to the reader.
The inhumanity of certain Kapos or team leaders given trusted duties by the SS who were extreamly sadistic beating fellow prisoners to death due to anger against what the SS were doing to their fellow countrymen.
Whilst reading the first two chapters one clearly realises these are the genuine testimony of somebody who lived on a daily basis where systematic murder was common place.Unless you witnessed at first hand you couldnot make up such testimony such as these.
As i have already said you can write about this highly documented period in history but unless you were physically there in person to witness these events no amount of research will reveal the actual truth.
This is why Filip Mullers book is so important,as less than a handfull of Sonderkommandos at Auschwitz actually lived to bear witness to their testimony.Every few months new Sonderkommandos were appointed whilst those working at the cremetoria were gassed with other prisoners so that the truth of Genocide was never allowed to escape.Filips survival is the more amazing in that he survived and bared witness to the atrocities.
Unless you were actually there in person you cannot envisage the horrors and brutality of camp guards and SS officers.Muller recounts day to day life within the confines of Auschwitz-Berkenhau like only a fellow prisoner could relate.
His matter of fact account of unimaginable horrors makes compelling reading if not unpleasant reading.He has not withheld any of the material that will disgust or distress us,everything has been accounted for right up to his amazing survival.
As a Sonderkommando he was to some extent safe as his services were of great importance to the camps efficient running.Without him and other workers the mass murder couldnot have taken place at such a large scale.
A book that is extreamly well written by somebody who actually knows what went on within the camp.Few books can bring home the true meaning of genocide as can this one.
If you are looking for great detail on events and life within Hitlers largest death camp then this book will not disappoint.
Brings the Reality of what went on home !, 11 May 2008
I visited Auschwitz earlier this year. I wish I had read this book before I had gone as it really brought home the terrible crimes that went on in this place. If you are interested in Auschwitz then this is a must read !
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Customer Reviews
Gripping yet fantasitc read., 17 Dec 2008
Well i have always been interested in the holocaust ever since i went to visit Anne Frank's house as a 12 year old girl. It really moved me yet didn't fully understand what the holocaust really meant or what had happened, yet I never forgot and since that day in Amsterdam I have followed documentaries intently and read around the subject.
Last year i decided i wanted, and needed to visit Auschwitz and I feel this is something everyone should do. I believe all school children should be taught about what happened there and we should never forget.
Visiting Auschwitz was a surreal experience and i felt as though i was walking round the set of a Hollywood movie. It is so surreal and hard to believe what happened there. It is beyond human comprehension the horrors suffered there, just over 60 years ago. I throughly enjoyed the visit and I mean that in a purely informative way. The visit brought me to tears and stays with you. There is so much to take in I would like to go back.
I will eventually get to my point!....
This book is a gripping read and a must for anyone who is interested in a first hand account of what actually happened there. I felt like i was living the experience with them and couldn't put it down.
Highly recommended and if you are thinking about visiting Auschwitz it is definatley worth the visit, there is lots of information on trip advisor about the best way to do it. Hope this helps xx
Disappointing, 15 Jul 2008
Truly the worst holocaust testimony ever written.So many mistakes throughout the whole text.Two examples of which were when Mr Muller mentions the camp orchestra in Birkenau,there was none, it was in Auschwitz 1.He also quotes that Kramer was in Birkenau and had came from Auschwitz 2.Both are one and the same place But important errors like these were repeated in every chapter and the worry for me is that Holocaust deniers may pick up on these simple blunders.Mr Mullers over use of adjectives and repetition of statements at times resulted in the book bordering on being boring.It read more like a students written essay who wasnt fully informed ,rather than an actual Holocaust survivors memoirs.Ive read many more imformative Holocaust testimonies and even Mr Muller must have been disappointed with the finished article.I tend to believe that the foreword said it all.
ochmister, 06 Jun 2008
Simple, one of the best books I have ever read. Very sad, sometimes un believable. But believe, this really happened and should not be forgotton. My respect goes to the author.
An account by somebody who witnessed everything first hand., 16 May 2008
There have been countless books written about Hitlers Final solution mostly by historians and occasionally by eyewitness survivors.
You can read account after account of conditions in the final months leading to the Russians eventual entry into the camp but few books will be as informative as this one written by camp Sonderkommando Filip Muller whose actual job was to operate the crematoria and dispose of the thousands of corpses.
During the latter half of 1944 an incredible 10,000+ were liquidated on a daily basis.This may appear too far fetched to comprehend at first but when you realise that those in command from Hitler right down to Himmlers eventual realisation that the war was turning against them a dramatic escelation in gassing took place until mass shootings were the norm and corpses were burnt round the clock in open pits.
At the height of the liquidation Berkenhau had over ten ovens working night and day resulting in a massive escalation of gassings.In early 1944,10,000 prisoners were murdered every day and there were sufficient ovens to cope with the huge number of bodies.
Filip was there as all this was going on and later as the mass of bodies became too overwhelming to cope with it was the Sonderkommandos duty to remove the rotting corpses for disposal in the ovens.
There are certain passages that will really make one think momentarily on the question of mans inhumanity towards his fellow man.
The arrival and first trial of mass gassings where under extream brutality men women and children were forced to undress knowingly they were facing certain death.
Possibly the most heart rending extracts are to be found on page 48 where Filip having discovered the arrival of his father at the camp has to cremate his body after his death from tythus.Fellow workmen working alongside him at the blazing ovens recite a prayer.
The book really brings the true barbarity of camp life to the reader.
The inhumanity of certain Kapos or team leaders given trusted duties by the SS who were extreamly sadistic beating fellow prisoners to death due to anger against what the SS were doing to their fellow countrymen.
Whilst reading the first two chapters one clearly realises these are the genuine testimony of somebody who lived on a daily basis where systematic murder was common place.Unless you witnessed at first hand you couldnot make up such testimony such as these.
As i have already said you can write about this highly documented period in history but unless you were physically there in person to witness these events no amount of research will reveal the actual truth.
This is why Filip Mullers book is so important,as less than a handfull of Sonderkommandos at Auschwitz actually lived to bear witness to their testimony.Every few months new Sonderkommandos were appointed whilst those working at the cremetoria were gassed with other prisoners so that the truth of Genocide was never allowed to escape.Filips survival is the more amazing in that he survived and bared witness to the atrocities.
Unless you were actually there in person you cannot envisage the horrors and brutality of camp guards and SS officers.Muller recounts day to day life within the confines of Auschwitz-Berkenhau like only a fellow prisoner could relate.
His matter of fact account of unimaginable horrors makes compelling reading if not unpleasant reading.He has not withheld any of the material that will disgust or distress us,everything has been accounted for right up to his amazing survival.
As a Sonderkommando he was to some extent safe as his services were of great importance to the camps efficient running.Without him and other workers the mass murder couldnot have taken place at such a large scale.
A book that is extreamly well written by somebody who actually knows what went on within the camp.Few books can bring home the true meaning of genocide as can this one.
If you are looking for great detail on events and life within Hitlers largest death camp then this book will not disappoint.
Brings the Reality of what went on home !, 11 May 2008
I visited Auschwitz earlier this year. I wish I had read this book before I had gone as it really brought home the terrible crimes that went on in this place. If you are interested in Auschwitz then this is a must read !
Inspiring, humbling........., 11 Aug 2008
Buy this book is all I can say, I have read many books on the holocaust, and life within the concentration camps, and 'Five Chimneys' is one well worth reading......... it will stay with you forever, I also highly recommend 'Is this a man' by Primo Levi. God Bless all the survivors, and all those who died such tragic deaths, under such unbelievable, hellish circumstances. It certainly puts ones life into perspective!
A True Story of Courage,Terror, and Inhuman Behaviour, 21 Mar 2008
Olga Lengyel went through hell and to survive and write such a clear and vivd account is fantastic. The suffering and torture that people went through and in the most disgusting of conditions must not be allowed to happen again.
Her book is a very vivd account and what all readers must do is not to allow a holocaust to repeat itself again. Millions of people suffered and died. We must all make sure that what happend is not forgotten and does not every happen again. That way they will not have suffered and died for nothing. You must read this book.
the true story of holocaust survival, 26 Nov 2007
having read this book some 15 to 20 years ago, i was very deeply moved by some of the pieces in the book, the story of olga sending her children to one side of the line at the railway staion only to find later that she had actually sent them to the gas chamber indeed almost brought me to tears then!
also the account of the amount of people compared to the cattle that were herded in to the cattle trucks was very destressing
i could almost tell the story of the top of my head but thats up to other people to find out them selves
Also having watched the BBC2 documentery the World at war about the holocaust,( which only scratched the surface compared to this book )i cannot rate this book any higher than the 5 stars this site allows
BUY IT, READ IT, BUT NEVER FORGET IT!
"The only way out is up the chimney", 16 Nov 2006
Another one of those books that 'should' be read, why? because someone wanted to survive simply to tell their tale. A story that the world wasn't meant to know. Apart from that it makes for compulsive reading and will make your present woes seem fairly insignificant.
moving, 17 Feb 2006
I read this book within 3 days i couldnt put it down, it was very moving and gives the reader a great insight in to life as a jew in world war 2 germany i highly recomend this book, with a box of tissues
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Product Description
Claudia Roden, author of The Book of Jewish Food, has done more than simply compile a cookbook of Jewish recipes--she has produced a history of the Diaspora, told through its cuisine. The book's 800 recipes reflect many cultures and regions of the world, from the Jewish quarter of Cairo where Roden spent her childhood to the kitchens of Europe, Asia and the Americas. Both Ashkenazi and Sepharidic cooking are well represented here: hallah bread, bagels, blintzes and kugels give way to tabbouleh, falafel and succulent lamb with prunes, which are, in turn, succeeded by such fare as Ftut (Yemeni wedding soup) and Kahk (savoury bracelets). Interwoven throughout the text are Roden's charming asides--the history of certain foods, definitions (Kaimak, for instance, is the cream that rises to the top when buffalo milk is simmered) and ways of preparing everything from an eggplant to a quince. In addition, Roden tells you everything you've ever wanted to know about Jewish dietary laws, what the ancient Hebrews ate and the various holidays and festivals on the Jewish calendar. Detailed sections on Jewish history are beautifully illustrated with archival photographs of families, towns and, of course, food. The Book of Jewish Food is one that any serious cook--Jewish and non-Jewish alike--would gladly have (and use often) in the kitchen. --Kyle Dean
Customer Reviews
Gripping yet fantasitc read., 17 Dec 2008
Well i have always been interested in the holocaust ever since i went to visit Anne Frank's house as a 12 year old girl. It really moved me yet didn't fully understand what the holocaust really meant or what had happened, yet I never forgot and since that day in Amsterdam I have followed documentaries intently and read around the subject.
Last year i decided i wanted, and needed to visit Auschwitz and I feel this is something everyone should do. I believe all school children should be taught about what happened there and we should never forget.
Visiting Auschwitz was a surreal experience and i felt as though i was walking round the set of a Hollywood movie. It is so surreal and hard to believe what happened there. It is beyond human comprehension the horrors suffered there, just over 60 years ago. I throughly enjoyed the visit and I mean that in a purely informative way. The visit brought me to tears and stays with you. There is so much to take in I would like to go back.
I will eventually get to my point!....
This book is a gripping read and a must for anyone who is interested in a first hand account of what actually happened there. I felt like i was living the experience with them and couldn't put it down.
Highly recommended and if you are thinking about visiting Auschwitz it is definatley worth the visit, there is lots of information on trip advisor about the best way to do it. Hope this helps xx Disappointing, 15 Jul 2008
Truly the worst holocaust testimony ever written.So many mistakes throughout the whole text.Two examples of which were when Mr Muller mentions the camp orchestra in Birkenau,there was none, it was in Auschwitz 1.He also quotes that Kramer was in Birkenau and had came from Auschwitz 2.Both are one and the same place But important errors like these were repeated in every chapter and the worry for me is that Holocaust deniers may pick up on these simple blunders.Mr Mullers over use of adjectives and repetition of statements at times resulted in the book bordering on being boring.It read more like a students written essay who wasnt fully informed ,rather than an actual Holocaust survivors memoirs.Ive read many more imformative Holocaust testimonies and even Mr Muller must have been disappointed with the finished article.I tend to believe that the foreword said it all. ochmister, 06 Jun 2008
Simple, one of the best books I have ever read. Very sad, sometimes un believable. But believe, this really happened and should not be forgotton. My respect goes to the author. An account by somebody who witnessed everything first hand., 16 May 2008
There have been countless books written about Hitlers Final solution mostly by historians and occasionally by eyewitness survivors.
You can read account after account of conditions in the final months leading to the Russians eventual entry into the camp but few books will be as informative as this one written by camp Sonderkommando Filip Muller whose actual job was to operate the crematoria and dispose of the thousands of corpses.
During the latter half of 1944 an incredible 10,000+ were liquidated on a daily basis.This may appear too far fetched to comprehend at first but when you realise that those in command from Hitler right down to Himmlers eventual realisation that the war was turning against them a dramatic escelation in gassing took place until mass shootings were the norm and corpses were burnt round the clock in open pits.
At the height of the liquidation Berkenhau had over ten ovens working night and day resulting in a massive escalation of gassings.In early 1944,10,000 prisoners were murdered every day and there were sufficient ovens to cope with the huge number of bodies.
Filip was there as all this was going on and later as the mass of bodies became too overwhelming to cope with it was the Sonderkommandos duty to remove the rotting corpses for disposal in the ovens.
There are certain passages that will really make one think momentarily on the question of mans inhumanity towards his fellow man.
The arrival and first trial of mass gassings where under extream brutality men women and children were forced to undress knowingly they were facing certain death.
Possibly the most heart rending extracts are to be found on page 48 where Filip having discovered the arrival of his father at the camp has to cremate his body after his death from tythus.Fellow workmen working alongside him at the blazing ovens recite a prayer.
The book really brings the true barbarity of camp life to the reader.
The inhumanity of certain Kapos or team leaders given trusted duties by the SS who were extreamly sadistic beating fellow prisoners to death due to anger against what the SS were doing to their fellow countrymen.
Whilst reading the first two chapters one clearly realises these are the genuine testimony of somebody who lived on a daily basis where systematic murder was common place.Unless you witnessed at first hand you couldnot make up such testimony such as these.
As i have already said you can write about this highly documented period in history but unless you were physically there in person to witness these events no amount of research will reveal the actual truth.
This is why Filip Mullers book is so important,as less than a handfull of Sonderkommandos at Auschwitz actually lived to bear witness to their testimony.Every few months new Sonderkommandos were appointed whilst those working at the cremetoria were gassed with other prisoners so that the truth of Genocide was never allowed to escape.Filips survival is the more amazing in that he survived and bared witness to the atrocities.
Unless you were actually there in person you cannot envisage the horrors and brutality of camp guards and SS officers.Muller recounts day to day life within the confines of Auschwitz-Berkenhau like only a fellow prisoner could relate.
His matter of fact account of unimaginable horrors makes compelling reading if not unpleasant reading.He has not withheld any of the material that will disgust or distress us,everything has been accounted for right up to his amazing survival.
As a Sonderkommando he was to some extent safe as his services were of great importance to the camps efficient running.Without him and other workers the mass murder couldnot have taken place at such a large scale.
A book that is extreamly well written by somebody who actually knows what went on within the camp.Few books can bring home the true meaning of genocide as can this one.
If you are looking for great detail on events and life within Hitlers largest death camp then this book will not disappoint. Brings the Reality of what went on home !, 11 May 2008
I visited Auschwitz earlier this year. I wish I had read this book before I had gone as it really brought home the terrible crimes that went on in this place. If you are interested in Auschwitz then this is a must read ! Inspiring, humbling........., 11 Aug 2008
Buy this book is all I can say, I have read many books on the holocaust, and life within the concentration camps, and 'Five Chimneys' is one well worth reading......... it will stay with you forever, I also highly recommend 'Is this a man' by Primo Levi. God Bless all the survivors, and all those who died such tragic deaths, under such unbelievable, hellish circumstances. It certainly puts ones life into perspective! A True Story of Courage,Terror, and Inhuman Behaviour, 21 Mar 2008
Olga Lengyel went through hell and to survive and write such a clear and vivd account is fantastic. The suffering and torture that people went through and in the most disgusting of conditions must not be allowed to happen again.
Her book is a very vivd account and what all readers must do is not to allow a holocaust to repeat itself again. Millions of people suffered and died. We must all make sure that what happend is not forgotten and does not every happen again. That way they will not have suffered and died for nothing. You must read this book. the true story of holocaust survival, 26 Nov 2007
having read this book some 15 to 20 years ago, i was very deeply moved by some of the pieces in the book, the story of olga sending her children to one side of the line at the railway staion only to find later that she had actually sent them to the gas chamber indeed almost brought me to tears then!
also the account of the amount of people compared to the cattle that were herded in to the cattle trucks was very destressing
i could almost tell the story of the top of my head but thats up to other people to find out them selves
Also having watched the BBC2 documentery the World at war about the holocaust,( which only scratched the surface compared to this book )i cannot rate this book any higher than the 5 stars this site allows
BUY IT, READ IT, BUT NEVER FORGET IT!
"The only way out is up the chimney", 16 Nov 2006
Another one of those books that 'should' be read, why? because someone wanted to survive simply to tell their tale. A story that the world wasn't meant to know. Apart from that it makes for compulsive reading and will make your present woes seem fairly insignificant. moving, 17 Feb 2006
I read this book within 3 days i couldnt put it down, it was very moving and gives the reader a great insight in to life as a jew in world war 2 germany i highly recomend this book, with a box of tissues Cookery and Scholarship in equal measure. , 27 Jul 2008
I can only add to the praise from other reviewers. This book is such a fascinating read from an historical and sociological point of view that one almost forgets it is a cookery book. I have to say that I was not at all bothered by the lack of photographs - I like my books to be collections of recipes, not to be picture books for grown ups. This is a solid work of meticulous research which deserves a place in the study as much as the kitchen Only One Thing Missing!, 14 Mar 2005
This is not so much a cook book more an encyclopedia of Jewish cooking and as such is very comprehensive. I doubt anyone could have any complaints with the amount of information or the number of recipes contained within its pages. The only drawback to this book is the total lack of photographs of the finished dishes and as such it does not inspire me to try creating any of them. Food is as much a visual experience as well as one of smells and tastes. As a cookbook it fails to inspire the reader to try and recreate the recipes but as a history of Jewish cooking it excels.
A history of the Jews through their stomachs!, 08 Mar 2004
A wonderful book that most of my family and friends own, my non-Jewish flatmate read through like a novel, and I always have difficulty putting down. Since Ashkenazi cooking can be found in countless other Jewish cookery books, I appreciated the main focus on Sephardic cooking. I am vegan and even so found hundreds of recipes. The cultural background information is fascinating, and the religious information enables you to produce something a bit different at the festivals - we had the most fabulous (Iranian, I think) stew last Rosh Hashanah, together with home-made challah, and were quite spoilt for choice when it came to making haroset. The only problem is that I get so seduced by reading the recipes that I end up making too much food! However, my friends have certainly been enjoying the pastries I take to meetings. I have had no problems following the delicious recipes and Roden is usefully realistic about substitutes for ingredients unobtainable in Britain, warnings for extra-hot dishes and so on. She also gives basic recipes followed by several variations for many dishes, especially the popular ones; this can be useful if you want a different slant on a traditional dish, for example a borsht which isn't too violently beetrooty. The personal touch - anecdotes about where she met the recipe donor, or traditional dishes in her family - is delightful.
The Book of Jewish Food: An Odyssey from Samarkand and Vilna, 14 Feb 2004
I think this is one of the best cookery books I have ever bought. The book is truely inspiring. I love the Rye Bread (served thinly sliced and served with cold meats or cheese) and the Honey Cake, both of which are a big hit with our family. Many of the salads are sensational, especially the Potatoes with Black Olives, plus many many more.
A great book!
A wonderful book about Judaism through the medium of food, 15 Jan 2003
I can only agree with the previous reviewers - as a cookbook this is excellent, crammed full of a tremendous number and variety of great recipes, sensibly organised. As a historical book of a people told through their food it's even better. It is nothing less than a social history of both Ashkenazi and Sephardi Judiasm told through the medium of food. The recipes have been collected and cherished by Roden, often from friends and relatives, on her travels. Most recipes are accompanied by the historical origins of the dish and thereby reveal something about Jews and Jewish life. The more celebrated and famous dishes, such as chopped liver and cholent, have whole pages of fascinating context, history and photographs devoted to them. The result is that, as well as eating a fantastic meal (the meatballs and apricots in tomato sauce served with spinach risotto rice and followed by apfel kugel mit eppel is my favourite) you have a real sense of occasion and connection when you eat...even if, like me, you're a Gentile; you know the importance and provenance of your food and can almost see the ragged bagel seller, smell the lid being taken off the sabbath stock pot in the shtetl when you eat. It's certainly the best and most readable cookbook I own, and in fact one of the most enjoyable books I own.
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Customer Reviews
Gripping yet fantasitc read., 17 Dec 2008
Well i have always been interested in the holocaust ever since i went to visit Anne Frank's house as a 12 year old girl. It really moved me yet didn't fully understand what the holocaust really meant or what had happened, yet I never forgot and since that day in Amsterdam I have followed documentaries intently and read around the subject.
Last year i decided i wanted, and needed to visit Auschwitz and I feel this is something everyone should do. I believe all school children should be taught about what happened there and we should never forget.
Visiting Auschwitz was a surreal experience and i felt as though i was walking round the set of a Hollywood movie. It is so surreal and hard to believe what happened there. It is beyond human comprehension the horrors suffered there, just over 60 years ago. I throughly enjoyed the visit and I mean that in a purely informative way. The visit brought me to tears and stays with you. There is so much to take in I would like to go back.
I will eventually get to my point!....
This book is a gripping read and a must for anyone who is interested in a first hand account of what actually happened there. I felt like i was living the experience with them and couldn't put it down.
Highly recommended and if you are thinking about visiting Auschwitz it is definatley worth the visit, there is lots of information on trip advisor about the best way to do it. Hope this helps xx Disappointing, 15 Jul 2008
Truly the worst holocaust testimony ever written.So many mistakes throughout the whole text.Two examples of which were when Mr Muller mentions the camp orchestra in Birkenau,there was none, it was in Auschwitz 1.He also quotes that Kramer was in Birkenau and had came from Auschwitz 2.Both are one and the same place But important errors like these were repeated in every chapter and the worry for me is that Holocaust deniers may pick up on these simple blunders.Mr Mullers over use of adjectives and repetition of statements at times resulted in the book bordering on being boring.It read more like a students written essay who wasnt fully informed ,rather than an actual Holocaust survivors memoirs.Ive read many more imformative Holocaust testimonies and even Mr Muller must have been disappointed with the finished article.I tend to believe that the foreword said it all. ochmister, 06 Jun 2008
Simple, one of the best books I have ever read. Very sad, sometimes un believable. But believe, this really happened and should not be forgotton. My respect goes to the author. An account by somebody who witnessed everything first hand., 16 May 2008
There have been countless books written about Hitlers Final solution mostly by historians and occasionally by eyewitness survivors.
You can read account after account of conditions in the final months leading to the Russians eventual entry into the camp but few books will be as informative as this one written by camp Sonderkommando Filip Muller whose actual job was to operate the crematoria and dispose of the thousands of corpses.
During the latter half of 1944 an incredible 10,000+ were liquidated on a daily basis.This may appear too far fetched to comprehend at first but when you realise that those in command from Hitler right down to Himmlers eventual realisation that the war was turning against them a dramatic escelation in gassing took place until mass shootings were the norm and corpses were burnt round the clock in open pits.
At the height of the liquidation Berkenhau had over ten ovens working night and day resulting in a massive escalation of gassings.In early 1944,10,000 prisoners were murdered every day and there were sufficient ovens to cope with the huge number of bodies.
Filip was there as all this was going on and later as the mass of bodies became too overwhelming to cope with it was the Sonderkommandos duty to remove the rotting corpses for disposal in the ovens.
There are certain passages that will really make one think momentarily on the question of mans inhumanity towards his fellow man.
The arrival and first trial of mass gassings where under extream brutality men women and children were forced to undress knowingly they were facing certain death.
Possibly the most heart rending extracts are to be found on page 48 where Filip having discovered the arrival of his father at the camp has to cremate his body after his death from tythus.Fellow workmen working alongside him at the blazing ovens recite a prayer.
The book really brings the true barbarity of camp life to the reader.
The inhumanity of certain Kapos or team leaders given trusted duties by the SS who were extreamly sadistic beating fellow prisoners to death due to anger against what the SS were doing to their fellow countrymen.
Whilst reading the first two chapters one clearly realises these are the genuine testimony of somebody who lived on a daily basis where systematic murder was common place.Unless you witnessed at first hand you couldnot make up such testimony such as these.
As i have already said you can write about this highly documented period in history but unless you were physically there in person to witness these events no amount of research will reveal the actual truth.
This is why Filip Mullers book is so important,as less than a handfull of Sonderkommandos at Auschwitz actually lived to bear witness to their testimony.Every few months new Sonderkommandos were appointed whilst those working at the cremetoria were gassed with other prisoners so that the truth of Genocide was never allowed to escape.Filips survival is the more amazing in that he survived and bared witness to the atrocities.
Unless you were actually there in person you cannot envisage the horrors and brutality of camp guards and SS officers.Muller recounts day to day life within the confines of Auschwitz-Berkenhau like only a fellow prisoner could relate.
His matter of fact account of unimaginable horrors makes compelling reading if not unpleasant reading.He has not withheld any of the material that will disgust or distress us,everything has been accounted for right up to his amazing survival.
As a Sonderkommando he was to some extent safe as his services were of great importance to the camps efficient running.Without him and other workers the mass murder couldnot have taken place at such a large scale.
A book that is extreamly well written by somebody who actually knows what went on within the camp.Few books can bring home the true meaning of genocide as can this one.
If you are looking for great detail on events and life within Hitlers largest death camp then this book will not disappoint. Brings the Reality of what went on home !, 11 May 2008
I visited Auschwitz earlier this year. I wish I had read this book before I had gone as it really brought home the terrible crimes that went on in this place. If you are interested in Auschwitz then this is a must read ! Inspiring, humbling........., 11 Aug 2008
Buy this book is all I can say, I have read many books on the holocaust, and life within the concentration camps, and 'Five Chimneys' is one well worth reading......... it will stay with you forever, I also highly recommend 'Is this a man' by Primo Levi. God Bless all the survivors, and all those who died such tragic deaths, under such unbelievable, hellish circumstances. It certainly puts ones life into perspective! A True Story of Courage,Terror, and Inhuman Behaviour, 21 Mar 2008
Olga Lengyel went through hell and to survive and write such a clear and vivd account is fantastic. The suffering and torture that people went through and in the most disgusting of conditions must not be allowed to happen again.
Her book is a very vivd account and what all readers must do is not to allow a holocaust to repeat itself again. Millions of people suffered and died. We must all make sure that what happend is not forgotten and does not every happen again. That way they will not have suffered and died for nothing. You must read this book. the true story of holocaust survival, 26 Nov 2007
having read this book some 15 to 20 years ago, i was very deeply moved by some of the pieces in the book, the story of olga sending her children to one side of the line at the railway staion only to find later that she had actually sent them to the gas chamber indeed almost brought me to tears then!
also the account of the amount of people compared to the cattle that were herded in to the cattle trucks was very destressing
i could almost tell the story of the top of my head but thats up to other people to find out them selves
Also having watched the BBC2 documentery the World at war about the holocaust,( which only scratched the surface compared to this book )i cannot rate this book any higher than the 5 stars this site allows
BUY IT, READ IT, BUT NEVER FORGET IT!
"The only way out is up the chimney", 16 Nov 2006
Another one of those books that 'should' be read, why? because someone wanted to survive simply to tell their tale. A story that the world wasn't meant to know. Apart from that it makes for compulsive reading and will make your present woes seem fairly insignificant. moving, 17 Feb 2006
I read this book within 3 days i couldnt put it down, it was very moving and gives the reader a great insight in to life as a jew in world war 2 germany i highly recomend this book, with a box of tissues Cookery and Scholarship in equal measure. , 27 Jul 2008
I can only add to the praise from other reviewers. This book is such a fascinating read from an historical and sociological point of view that one almost forgets it is a cookery book. I have to say that I was not at all bothered by the lack of photographs - I like my books to be collections of recipes, not to be picture books for grown ups. This is a solid work of meticulous research which deserves a place in the study as much as the kitchen Only One Thing Missing!, 14 Mar 2005
This is not so much a cook book more an encyclopedia of Jewish cooking and as such is very comprehensive. I doubt anyone could have any complaints with the amount of information or the number of recipes contained within its pages. The only drawback to this book is the total lack of photographs of the finished dishes and as such it does not inspire me to try creating any of them. Food is as much a visual experience as well as one of smells and tastes. As a cookbook it fails to inspire the reader to try and recreate the recipes but as a history of Jewish cooking it excels.
A history of the Jews through their stomachs!, 08 Mar 2004
A wonderful book that most of my family and friends own, my non-Jewish flatmate read through like a novel, and I always have difficulty putting down. Since Ashkenazi cooking can be found in countless other Jewish cookery books, I appreciated the main focus on Sephardic cooking. I am vegan and even so found hundreds of recipes. The cultural background information is fascinating, and the religious information enables you to produce something a bit different at the festivals - we had the most fabulous (Iranian, I think) stew last Rosh Hashanah, together with home-made challah, and were quite spoilt for choice when it came to making haroset. The only problem is that I get so seduced by reading the recipes that I end up making too much food! However, my friends have certainly been enjoying the pastries I take to meetings. I have had no problems following the delicious recipes and Roden is usefully realistic about substitutes for ingredients unobtainable in Britain, warnings for extra-hot dishes and so on. She also gives basic recipes followed by several variations for many dishes, especially the popular ones; this can be useful if you want a different slant on a traditional dish, for example a borsht which isn't too violently beetrooty. The personal touch - anecdotes about where she met the recipe donor, or traditional dishes in her family - is delightful.
The Book of Jewish Food: An Odyssey from Samarkand and Vilna, 14 Feb 2004
I think this is one of the best cookery books I have ever bought. The book is truely inspiring. I love the Rye Bread (served thinly sliced and served with cold meats or cheese) and the Honey Cake, both of which are a big hit with our family. Many of the salads are sensational, especially the Potatoes with Black Olives, plus many many more.
A great book!
A wonderful book about Judaism through the medium of food, 15 Jan 2003
I can only agree with the previous reviewers - as a cookbook this is excellent, crammed full of a tremendous number and variety of great recipes, sensibly organised. As a historical book of a people told through their food it's even better. It is nothing less than a social history of both Ashkenazi and Sephardi Judiasm told through the medium of food. The recipes have been collected and cherished by Roden, often from friends and relatives, on her travels. Most recipes are accompanied by the historical origins of the dish and thereby reveal something about Jews and Jewish life. The more celebrated and famous dishes, such as chopped liver and cholent, have whole pages of fascinating context, history and photographs devoted to them. The result is that, as well as eating a fantastic meal (the meatballs and apricots in tomato sauce served with spinach risotto rice and followed by apfel kugel mit eppel is my favourite) you have a real sense of occasion and connection when you eat...even if, like me, you're a Gentile; you know the importance and provenance of your food and can almost see the ragged bagel seller, smell the lid being taken off the sabbath stock pot in the shtetl when you eat. It's certainly the best and most readable cookbook I own, and in fact one of the most enjoyable books I own.
interesting for people of that era, 26 May 2000
a true story,poignant to the point of tears for any young reader who might have experienced similar separations from their parents,and this is still being repeated now all over the world....russian jews,cubans,vietnamese....etc..Would like to be put in touch with author ,Vera Gissing...as the part about ceiling falling down in dining room did have one additional casualty,and that was kind of hushed up by the nurse( Dr. Frieds friend!)
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Customer Reviews
Gripping yet fantasitc read., 17 Dec 2008
Well i have always been interested in the holocaust ever since i went to visit Anne Frank's house as a 12 year old girl. It really moved me yet didn't fully understand what the holocaust really meant or what had happened, yet I never forgot and since that day in Amsterdam I have followed documentaries intently and read around the subject.
Last year i decided i wanted, and needed to visit Auschwitz and I feel this is something everyone should do. I believe all school children should be taught about what happened there and we should never forget.
Visiting Auschwitz was a surreal experience and i felt as though i was walking round the set of a Hollywood movie. It is so surreal and hard to believe what happened there. It is beyond human comprehension the horrors suffered there, just over 60 years ago. I throughly enjoyed the visit and I mean that in a purely informative way. The visit brought me to tears and stays with you. There is so much to take in I would like to go back.
I will eventually get to my point!....
This book is a gripping read and a must for anyone who is interested in a first hand account of what actually happened there. I felt like i was living the experience with them and couldn't put it down.
Highly recommended and if you are thinking about visiting Auschwitz it is definatley worth the visit, there is lots of information on trip advisor about the best way to do it. Hope this helps xx Disappointing, 15 Jul 2008
Truly the worst holocaust testimony ever written.So many mistakes throughout the whole text.Two examples of which were when Mr Muller mentions the camp orchestra in Birkenau,there was none, it was in Auschwitz 1.He also quotes that Kramer was in Birkenau and had came from Auschwitz 2.Both are one and the same place But important errors like these were repeated in every chapter and the worry for me is that Holocaust deniers may pick up on these simple blunders.Mr Mullers over use of adjectives and repetition of statements at times resulted in the book bordering on being boring.It read more like a students written essay who wasnt fully informed ,rather than an actual Holocaust survivors memoirs.Ive read many more imformative Holocaust testimonies and even Mr Muller must have been disappointed with the finished article.I tend to believe that the foreword said it all. ochmister, 06 Jun 2008
Simple, one of the best books I have ever read. Very sad, sometimes un believable. But believe, this really happened and should not be forgotton. My respect goes to the author. An account by somebody who witnessed everything first hand., 16 May 2008
There have been countless books written about Hitlers Final solution mostly by historians and occasionally by eyewitness survivors.
You can read account after account of conditions in the final months leading to the Russians eventual entry into the camp but few books will be as informative as this one written by camp Sonderkommando Filip Muller whose actual job was to operate the crematoria and dispose of the thousands of corpses.
During the latter half of 1944 an incredible 10,000+ were liquidated on a daily basis.This may appear too far fetched to comprehend at first but when you realise that those in command from Hitler right down to Himmlers eventual realisation that the war was turning against them a dramatic escelation in gassing took place until mass shootings were the norm and corpses were burnt round the clock in open pits.
At the height of the liquidation Berkenhau had over ten ovens working night and day resulting in a massive escalation of gassings.In early 1944,10,000 prisoners were murdered every day and there were sufficient ovens to cope with the huge number of bodies.
Filip was there as all this was going on and later as the mass of bodies became too overwhelming to cope with it was the Sonderkommandos duty to remove the rotting corpses for disposal in the ovens.
There are certain passages that will really make one think momentarily on the question of mans inhumanity towards his fellow man.
The arrival and first trial of mass gassings where under extream brutality men women and children were forced to undress knowingly they were facing certain death.
Possibly the most heart rending extracts are to be found on page 48 where Filip having discovered the arrival of his father at the camp has to cremate his body after his death from tythus.Fellow workmen working alongside him at the blazing ovens recite a prayer.
The book really brings the true barbarity of camp life to the reader.
The inhumanity of certain Kapos or team leaders given trusted duties by the SS who were extreamly sadistic beating fellow prisoners to death due to anger against what the SS were doing to their fellow countrymen.
Whilst reading the first two chapters one clearly realises these are the genuine testimony of somebody who lived on a daily basis where systematic murder was common place.Unless you witnessed at first hand you couldnot make up such testimony such as these.
As i have already said you can write about this highly documented period in history but unless you were physically there in person to witness these events no amount of research will reveal the actual truth.
This is why Filip Mullers book is so important,as less than a handfull of Sonderkommandos at Auschwitz actually lived to bear witness to their testimony.Every few months new Sonderkommandos were appointed whilst those working at the cremetoria were gassed with other prisoners so that the truth of Genocide was never allowed to escape.Filips survival is the more amazing in that he survived and bared witness to the atrocities.
Unless you were actually there in person you cannot envisage the horrors and brutality of camp guards and SS officers.Muller recounts day to day life within the confines of Auschwitz-Berkenhau like only a fellow prisoner could relate.
His matter of fact account of unimaginable horrors makes compelling reading if not unpleasant reading.He has not withheld any of the material that will disgust or distress us,everything has been accounted for right up to his amazing survival.
As a Sonderkommando he was to some extent safe as his services were of great importance to the camps efficient running.Without him and other workers the mass murder couldnot have taken place at such a large scale.
A book that is extreamly well written by somebody who actually knows what went on within the camp.Few books can bring home the true meaning of genocide as can this one.
If you are looking for great detail on events and life within Hitlers largest death camp then this book will not disappoint. Brings the Reality of what went on home !, 11 May 2008
I visited Auschwitz earlier this year. I wish I had read this book before I had gone as it really brought home the terrible crimes that went on in this place. If you are interested in Auschwitz then this is a must read ! Inspiring, humbling........., 11 Aug 2008
Buy this book is all I can say, I have read many books on the holocaust, and life within the concentration camps, and 'Five Chimneys' is one well worth reading......... it will stay with you forever, I also highly recommend 'Is this a man' by Primo Levi. God Bless all the survivors, and all those who died such tragic deaths, under such unbelievable, hellish circumstances. It certainly puts ones life into perspective! A True Story of Courage,Terror, and Inhuman Behaviour, 21 Mar 2008
Olga Lengyel went through hell and to survive and write such a clear and vivd account is fantastic. The suffering and torture that people went through and in the most disgusting of conditions must not be allowed to happen again.
Her book is a very vivd account and what all readers must do is not to allow a holocaust to repeat itself again. Millions of people suffered and died. We must all make sure that what happend is not forgotten and does not every happen again. That way they will not have suffered and died for nothing. You must read this book. the true story of holocaust survival, 26 Nov 2007
having read this book some 15 to 20 years ago, i was very deeply moved by some of the pieces in the book, the story of olga sending her children to one side of the line at the railway staion only to find later that she had actually sent them to the gas chamber indeed almost brought me to tears then!
also the account of the amount of people compared to the cattle that were herded in to the cattle trucks was very destressing
i could almost tell the story of the top of my head but thats up to other people to find out them selves
Also having watched the BBC2 documentery the World at war about the holocaust,( which only scratched the surface compared to this book )i cannot rate this book any higher than the 5 stars this site allows
BUY IT, READ IT, BUT NEVER FORGET IT!
"The only way out is up the chimney", 16 Nov 2006
Another one of those books that 'should' be read, why? because someone wanted to survive simply to tell their tale. A story that the world wasn't meant to know. Apart from that it makes for compulsive reading and will make your present woes seem fairly insignificant. moving, 17 Feb 2006
I read this book within 3 days i couldnt put it down, it was very moving and gives the reader a great insight in to life as a jew in world war 2 germany i highly recomend this book, with a box of tissues Cookery and Scholarship in equal measure. , 27 Jul 2008
I can only add to the praise from other reviewers. This book is such a fascinating read from an historical and sociological point of view that one almost forgets it is a cookery book. I have to say that I was not at all bothered by the lack of photographs - I like my books to be collections of recipes, not to be picture books for grown ups. This is a solid work of meticulous research which deserves a place in the study as much as the kitchen Only One Thing Missing!, 14 Mar 2005
This is not so much a cook book more an encyclopedia of Jewish cooking and as such is very comprehensive. I doubt anyone could have any complaints with the amount of information or the number of recipes contained within its pages. The only drawback to this book is the total lack of photographs of the finished dishes and as such it does not inspire me to try creating any of them. Food is as much a visual experience as well as one of smells and tastes. As a cookbook it fails to inspire the reader to try and recreate the recipes but as a history of Jewish cooking it excels.
A history of the Jews through their stomachs!, 08 Mar 2004
A wonderful book that most of my family and friends own, my non-Jewish flatmate read through like a novel, and I always have difficulty putting down. Since Ashkenazi cooking can be found in countless other Jewish cookery books, I appreciated the main focus on Sephardic cooking. I am vegan and even so found hundreds of recipes. The cultural background information is fascinating, and the religious information enables you to produce something a bit different at the festivals - we had the most fabulous (Iranian, I think) stew last Rosh Hashanah, together with home-made challah, and were quite spoilt for choice when it came to making haroset. The only problem is that I get so seduced by reading the recipes that I end up making too much food! However, my friends have certainly been enjoying the pastries I take to meetings. I have had no problems following the delicious recipes and Roden is usefully realistic about substitutes for ingredients unobtainable in Britain, warnings for extra-hot dishes and so on. She also gives basic recipes followed by several variations for many dishes, especially the popular ones; this can be useful if you want a different slant on a traditional dish, for example a borsht which isn't too violently beetrooty. The personal touch - anecdotes about where she met the recipe donor, or traditional dishes in her family - is delightful.
The Book of Jewish Food: An Odyssey from Samarkand and Vilna, 14 Feb 2004
I think this is one of the best cookery books I have ever bought. The book is truely inspiring. I love the Rye Bread (served thinly sliced and served with cold meats or cheese) and the Honey Cake, both of which are a big hit with our family. Many of the salads are sensational, especially the Potatoes with Black Olives, plus many many more.
A great book!
A wonderful book about Judaism through the medium of food, 15 Jan 2003
I can only agree with the previous reviewers - as a cookbook this is excellent, crammed full of a tremendous number and variety of great recipes, sensibly organised. As a historical book of a people told through their food it's even better. It is nothing less than a social history of both Ashkenazi and Sephardi Judiasm told through the medium of food. The recipes have been collected and cherished by Roden, often from friends and relatives, on her travels. Most recipes are accompanied by the historical origins of the dish and thereby reveal something about Jews and Jewish life. The more celebrated and famous dishes, such as chopped liver and cholent, have whole pages of fascinating context, history and photographs devoted to them. The result is that, as well as eating a fantastic meal (the meatballs and apricots in tomato sauce served with spinach risotto rice and followed by apfel kugel mit eppel is my favourite) you have a real sense of occasion and connection when you eat...even if, like me, you're a Gentile; you know the importance and provenance of your food and can almost see the ragged bagel seller, smell the lid being taken off the sabbath stock pot in the shtetl when you eat. It's certainly the best and most readable cookbook I own, and in fact one of the most enjoyable books I own.
interesting for people of that era, 26 May 2000
a true story,poignant to the point of tears for any young reader who might have experienced similar separations from their parents,and this is still being repeated now all over the world....russian jews,cubans,vietnamese....etc..Would like to be put in touch with author ,Vera Gissing...as the part about ceiling falling down in dining room did have one additional casualty,and that was kind of hushed up by the nurse( Dr. Frieds friend!)
utterly fantastic, 22 May 2007
This is an awe-inspiring story of unbelievable courage. I would have sworn it was fiction had I not known it was a true story; that these three brothers managed to save over 1000 people in the forests of Belarus is simply amazing.
The author does an excellent job of portraying the Bielski brothers not as one dimensional "larger than life" figures, but as human beings with faults and failings. Still, it is a great tragedy that the brothers were never recognised as the accomplished heros they were; one of them died in the Red Army shortly after the camp was disbanded, and the other two died anonymous immigrants in the United States.
Even people who haven't the slightest interest in the Holocaust or in WW2 will be inspired by the amazing story in this book.
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Customer Reviews
Gripping yet fantasitc read., 17 Dec 2008
Well i have always been interested in the holocaust ever since i went to visit Anne Frank's house as a 12 year old girl. It really moved me yet didn't fully understand what the holocaust really meant or what had happened, yet I never forgot and since that day in Amsterdam I have followed documentaries intently and read around the subject.
Last year i decided i wanted, and needed to visit Auschwitz and I feel this is something everyone should do. I believe all school children should be taught about what happened there and we should never forget.
Visiting Auschwitz was a surreal experience and i felt as though i was walking round the set of a Hollywood movie. It is so surreal and hard to believe what happened there. It is beyond human comprehension the horrors suffered there, just over 60 years ago. I throughly enjoyed the visit and I mean that in a purely informative way. The visit brought me to tears and stays with you. There is so much to take in I would like to go back.
I will eventually get to my point!....
This book is a gripping read and a must for anyone who is interested in a first hand account of what actually happened there. I felt like i was living the experience with them and couldn't put it down.
Highly recommended and if you are thinking about visiting Auschwitz it is definatley worth the visit, there is lots of information on trip advisor about the best way to do it. Hope this helps xx Disappointing, 15 Jul 2008
Truly the worst holocaust testimony ever written.So many mistakes throughout the whole text.Two examples of which were when Mr Muller mentions the camp orchestra in Birkenau,there was none, it was in Auschwitz 1.He also quotes that Kramer was in Birkenau and had came from Auschwitz 2.Both are one and the same place But important errors like these were repeated in every chapter and the worry for me is that Holocaust deniers may pick up on these simple blunders.Mr Mullers over use of adjectives and repetition of statements at times resulted in the book bordering on being boring.It read more like a students written essay who wasnt fully informed ,rather than an actual Holocaust survivors memoirs.Ive read many more imformative Holocaust testimonies and even Mr Muller must have been disappointed with the finished article.I tend to believe that the foreword said it all. ochmister, 06 Jun 2008
Simple, one of the best books I have ever read. Very sad, sometimes un believable. But believe, this really happened and should not be forgotton. My respect goes to the author. An account by somebody who witnessed everything first hand., 16 May 2008
There have been countless books written about Hitlers Final solution mostly by historians and occasionally by eyewitness survivors.
You can read account after account of conditions in the final months leading to the Russians eventual entry into the camp but few books will be as informative as this one written by camp Sonderkommando Filip Muller whose actual job was to operate the crematoria and dispose of the thousands of corpses.
During the latter half of 1944 an incredible 10,000+ were liquidated on a daily basis.This may appear too far fetched to comprehend at first but when you realise that those in command from Hitler right down to Himmlers eventual realisation that the war was turning against them a dramatic escelation in gassing took place until mass shootings were the norm and corpses were burnt round the clock in open pits.
At the height of the liquidation Berkenhau had over ten ovens working night and day resulting in a massive escalation of gassings.In early 1944,10,000 prisoners were murdered every day and there were sufficient ovens to cope with the huge number of bodies.
Filip was there as all this was going on and later as the mass of bodies became too overwhelming to cope with it was the Sonderkommandos duty to remove the rotting corpses for disposal in the ovens.
There are certain passages that will really make one think momentarily on the question of mans inhumanity towards his fellow man.
The arrival and first trial of mass gassings where under extream brutality men women and children were forced to undress knowingly they were facing certain death.
Possibly the most heart rending extracts are to be found on page 48 where Filip having discovered the arrival of his father at the camp has to cremate his body after his death from tythus.Fellow workmen working alongside him at the blazing ovens recite a prayer.
The book really brings the true barbarity of camp life to the reader.
The inhumanity of certain Kapos or team leaders given trusted duties by the SS who were extreamly sadistic beating fellow prisoners to death due to anger against what the SS were doing to their fellow countrymen.
Whilst reading the first two chapters one clearly realises these are the genuine testimony of somebody who lived on a daily basis where systematic murder was common place.Unless you witnessed at first hand you couldnot make up such testimony such as these.
As i have already said you can write about this highly documented period in history but unless you were physically there in person to witness these events no amount of research will reveal the actual truth.
This is why Filip Mullers book is so important,as less than a handfull of Sonderkommandos at Auschwitz actually lived to bear witness to their testimony.Every few months new Sonderkommandos were appointed whilst those working at the cremetoria were gassed with other prisoners so that the truth of Genocide was never allowed to escape.Filips survival is the more amazing in that he survived and bared witness to the atrocities.
Unless you were actually there in person you cannot envisage the horrors and brutality of camp guards and SS officers.Muller recounts day to day life within the confines of Auschwitz-Berkenhau like only a fellow prisoner could relate.
His matter of fact account of unimaginable horrors makes compelling reading if not unpleasant reading.He has not withheld any of the material that will disgust or distress us,everything has been accounted for right up to his amazing survival.
As a Sonderkommando he was to some extent safe as his services were of great importance to the camps efficient running.Without him and other workers the mass murder couldnot have taken place at such a large scale.
A book that is extreamly well written by somebody who actually knows what went on within the camp.Few books can bring home the true meaning of genocide as can this one.
If you are looking for great detail on events and life within Hitlers largest death camp then this book will not disappoint. Brings the Reality of what went on home !, 11 May 2008
I visited Auschwitz earlier this year. I wish I had read this book before I had gone as it really brought home the terrible crimes that went on in this place. If you are interested in Auschwitz then this is a must read ! Inspiring, humbling........., 11 Aug 2008
Buy this book is all I can say, I have read many books on the holocaust, and life within the concentration camps, and 'Five Chimneys' is one well worth reading......... it will stay with you forever, I also highly recommend 'Is this a man' by Primo Levi. God Bless all the survivors, and all those who died such tragic deaths, under such unbelievable, hellish circumstances. It certainly puts ones life into perspective! A True Story of Courage,Terror, and Inhuman Behaviour, 21 Mar 2008
Olga Lengyel went through hell and to survive and write such a clear and vivd account is fantastic. The suffering and torture that people went through and in the most disgusting of conditions must not be allowed to happen again.
Her book is a very vivd account and what all readers must do is not to allow a holocaust to repeat itself again. Millions of people suffered and died. We must all make sure that what happend is not forgotten and does not every happen again. That way they will not have suffered and died for nothing. You must read this book. the true story of holocaust survival, 26 Nov 2007
having read this book some 15 to 20 years ago, i was very deeply moved by some of the pieces in the book, the story of olga sending her children to one side of the line at the railway staion only to find later that she had actually sent them to the gas chamber indeed almost brought me to tears then!
also the account of the amount of people compared to the cattle that were herded in to the cattle trucks was very destressing
i could almost tell the story of the top of my head but thats up to other people to find out them selves
Also having watched the BBC2 documentery the World at war about the holocaust,( which only scratched the surface compared to this book )i cannot rate this book any higher than the 5 stars this site allows
BUY IT, READ IT, BUT NEVER FORGET IT!
"The only way out is up the chimney", 16 Nov 2006
Another one of those books that 'should' be read, why? because someone wanted to survive simply to tell their tale. A story that the world wasn't meant to know. Apart from that it makes for compulsive reading and will make your present woes seem fairly insignificant. moving, 17 Feb 2006
I read this book within 3 days i couldnt put it down, it was very moving and gives the reader a great insight in to life as a jew in world war 2 germany i highly recomend this book, with a box of tissues Cookery and Scholarship in equal measure. , 27 Jul 2008
I can only add to the praise from other reviewers. This book is such a fascinating read from an historical and sociological point of view that one almost forgets it is a cookery book. I have to say that I was not at all bothered by the lack of photographs - I like my books to be collections of recipes, not to be picture books for grown ups. This is a solid work of meticulous research which deserves a place in the study as much as the kitchen Only One Thing Missing!, 14 Mar 2005
This is not so much a cook book more an encyclopedia of Jewish cooking and as such is very comprehensive. I doubt anyone could have any complaints with the amount of information or the number of recipes contained within its pages. The only drawback to this book is the total lack of photographs of the finished dishes and as such it does not inspire me to try creating any of them. Food is as much a visual experience as well as one of smells and tastes. As a cookbook it fails to inspire the reader to try and recreate the recipes but as a history of Jewish cooking it excels.
A history of the Jews through their stomachs!, 08 Mar 2004
A wonderful book that most of my family and friends own, my non-Jewish flatmate read through like a novel, and I always have difficulty putting down. Since Ashkenazi cooking can be found in countless other Jewish cookery books, I appreciated the main focus on Sephardic cooking. I am vegan and even so found hundreds of recipes. The cultural background information is fascinating, and the religious information enables you to produce something a bit different at the festivals - we had the most fabulous (Iranian, I think) stew last Rosh Hashanah, together with home-made challah, and were quite spoilt for choice when it came to making haroset. The only problem is that I get so seduced by reading the recipes that I end up making too much food! However, my friends have certainly been enjoying the pastries I take to meetings. I have had no problems following the delicious recipes and Roden is usefully realistic about substitutes for ingredients unobtainable in Britain, warnings for extra-hot dishes and so on. She also gives basic recipes followed by several variations for many dishes, especially the popular ones; this can be useful if you want a different slant on a traditional dish, for example a borsht which isn't too violently beetrooty. The personal touch - anecdotes about where she met the recipe donor, or traditional dishes in her family - is delightful.
The Book of Jewish Food: An Odyssey from Samarkand and Vilna, 14 Feb 2004
I think this is one of the best cookery books I have ever bought. The book is truely inspiring. I love the Rye Bread (served thinly sliced and served with cold meats or cheese) and the Honey Cake, both of which are a big hit with our family. Many of the salads are sensational, especially the Potatoes with Black Olives, plus many many more.
A great book!
A wonderful book about Judaism through the medium of food, 15 Jan 2003
I can only agree with the previous reviewers - as a cookbook this is excellent, crammed full of a tremendous number and variety of great recipes, sensibly organised. As a historical book of a people told through their food it's even better. It is nothing less than a social history of both Ashkenazi and Sephardi Judiasm told through the medium of food. The recipes have been collected and cherished by Roden, often from friends and relatives, on her travels. Most recipes are accompanied by the historical origins of the dish and thereby reveal something about Jews and Jewish life. The more celebrated and famous dishes, such as chopped liver and cholent, have whole pages of fascinating context, history and photographs devoted to them. The result is that, as well as eating a fantastic meal (the meatballs and apricots in tomato sauce served with spinach risotto rice and followed by apfel kugel mit eppel is my favourite) you have a real sense of occasion and connection when you eat...even if, like me, you're a Gentile; you know the importance and provenance of your food and can almost see the ragged bagel seller, smell the lid being taken off the sabbath stock pot in the shtetl when you eat. It's certainly the best and most readable cookbook I own, and in fact one of the most enjoyable books I own.
interesting for people of that era, 26 May 2000
a true story,poignant to the point of tears for any young reader who might have experienced similar separations from their parents,and this is still being repeated now all over the world....russian jews,cubans,vietnamese....etc..Would like to be put in touch with author ,Vera Gissing...as the part about ceiling falling down in dining room did have one additional casualty,and that was kind of hushed up by the nurse( Dr. Frieds friend!)
utterly fantastic, 22 May 2007
This is an awe-inspiring story of unbelievable courage. I would have sworn it was fiction had I not known it was a true story; that these three brothers managed to save over 1000 people in the forests of Belarus is simply amazing.
The author does an excellent job of portraying the Bielski brothers not as one dimensional "larger than life" figures, but as human beings with faults and failings. Still, it is a great tragedy that the brothers were never recognised as the accomplished heros they were; one of them died in the Red Army shortly after the camp was disbanded, and the other two died anonymous immigrants in the United States.
Even people who haven't the slightest interest in the Holocaust or in WW2 will be inspired by the amazing story in this book.
Time to fight back, 02 Oct 2007
The zionists have been using dubious claims about the events of World War 2 to justify their own holocaust against the unfortunate Palestinians. These disgusting people have to be removed from the middle east and speaking out in word, action and deed is the way we are going to achieve this.
A brave book and a thought provoking read , 22 Sep 2007
I have read many books on the Nazi Holocaust and had a growing personal discomfort about the manner in which the non-Jewish element was increasingly marginalised (I must admit that I had a similar feeling when I started learning about the numbers of Asian non-POWS who had been killed in building the Death Railway in Burma in WWII, a feature that is ignored in most books of that event). This feeling was added to when I visited the Holocaust Museum in Washington. Now in this book I have some basis for understanding my discomfort though for reasons I had not envisaged.
Finkelstein's book delivers a very hard hitting analysis of how the Holocaust has been increasingly suborned to a mixture of Jewish American political and religious personal interests and the Israeli pursuit of garnering US support post the 1967 Six Days War, covering key events up to the current day. At times he has a very personal and edgy emotional style in dealing with counter arguments but given the personal abuse and attacks he has suffered from such groups, this adds to the drama of the story he tells. His analysis of the abuses engineered under the Swiss "Nazi Gold" claims alone is worth the price of this book in my mind.
Read and you will not be unmoved even if you disagree certain points.
Eye opener, 03 Sep 2007
A very interesting book with lots of facts and figures that really cause one to reflect. Unlike many books that I have read, it is not fiction pretending to be fact. It is a serious book, and often not easy to read. I would venture that it's not particularly well organised and at times perhaps not even that well written. But that's fine because our primary demand from factual books is that they are factual, not that they are great literary works.
a tour de force, 20 Jun 2007
For the various political currents of Zionism, Norman Finkelstein is a particularly terrifying foe - his polemical edge had me wincing with delight; his holocaust-survivor parents deflect the crude character assassinations so favoured of the ADL; and most of all, his rare erudition and sharp scholarship, which has won plaudits from such luminaries as Raul Hilberg (who uses much of the present work's research, citing it as a "breakthrough"), presents a serious intellectual challenge. Not many people could commit themselves to proving Alan Dershowitz's wholesale lifting of research on a footnote by footnote basis, but Finkelstein does it in another book, and he has you chuckling all the way at the sheer audacity of it all.
The case for the book has already been made, so I simply wish to briefly correct "a reader"'s complaints that "The Holocaust Industry" is a "polemical barrage" which "lacks context" and is inferior to the more nucanced approach of Peter Novick. This does not note that Finkelstein both refers to and criticises Novick in this work, criticisms unaddressed by comrade 'reader'. It also ignores the fact that nuance is not always desirable - there was nothing "nuanced" about Hitler's policy of mass extermination, for a start, and the Holocaust Industry's record, while obviously not nearly as horrendous as Hitler's, is no more possessed of shades of grey. In fact, Finkelstein's whole thesis is that this all represents an attempt to introduce shades of grey artificially into a fairly black and white issue - the ethnic cleansing and subsequent occupation of Palestinians by the state of Israel.
Ugly Businesses Are Rampant Worldwide, 10 May 2004
It seems a little odd at first glance that activists of the Anti-Nazi movement criticise this book like Mike Simons did in "Socialist Review" in September, 2000.
But it does totally make sense, as Simons wrote; "[The] memory of the Holocaust is the biggest barrier to the rebirth of a modern Nazi movement." I think they want to say at heart; "You should not throw a wet blanket over the righteous movement."
Still, those Anti-Nazi activists and other left-wingers who call the Israeli state "Fascist" make the matter indigestible. It seems to me that there are no differences, apart from the motivation, money on one hand and ideology on the other, between both the Jewish cheaters and the agents of the Anti-Nazi movement because both of them are, in reality, profiting from the Holocaust Industry. By the way, Holocaust Industry seems to be not only one industry of such kind that makes profits for various people worldwide involving money and ideological activities. Here, I name "Nanking Massacre/ Rape of Nanking", which was coincidentally called "forgotten holocaust of the world war 2" by Iris Chang, the author of the best-selling book, "the Rape of Nanking", for another "Industry".
Although many contemporary documented evidences suggest that such massacre on both civilians and the soldiers (other than legitimate executions of unlawful soldiers) never happened, the propaganda story has evolved into a large-scale profit-making machine hugely supported by a still influential historical view of the Tokyo Trial for over half a century. In this "Industry", however, as well as other "Japan's Wartime Atrocities Industries" mostly the Tokyo Trial created such as "Comfort Women Industry" and "Unit 731 Industry" and so on, there is a quite peculiar side that "the Holocaust Industry" never has: bogus perpetrators. Among those bogus perpetrators, there are a few hundreds of the victims of the Chinese "brain-washing" who "confessed" horrible crimes before the Chinese People's Court after "reformed" their "inhumane thought" to "righteous" Anti-Japanese Imperialism at the Fuxuan War Criminal Camp in China for 5 to 10 years after transported from Russian slave labour camps in Siberia in July, 1950, by the direct order of Stalin. (Of course, by doing that, both China and Soviet Union was violating the Potsdam Declaration art. 9 which stated the Japanese soldiers should be returned "to their homes" after the war.)
They were returned to Japan as planned and formed "Association of the Soldiers Returned from China" to advocate the Anti-Japanese Imperialism publishing books and giving lectures throughout Japan and China. However, the biggest profit they have made so far is, actually, not for themselves but for the Anti-Japanese campaigners of both the Japanese and the Chinese. (Sometimes for the Korean, too.)
Sadly, they will never be able to come to realisation that they were actually "brain-washed" and, most importantly, are not real perpetrators of the barbaric crimes they "confessed", therefore, there is no need for them to suffer from painful guilt, just because the Chinese Communist Party and their sympathisers in Japan, as well as other left-wingers who are of anti-Japanese sentiment, never ever let them unless, like the U.S. authority did to their own "brain-washing" victims of China, some decent authority in Japan take care of them as "victims" of the mental manipulation called "thought reform". But, that is unlikely because there are strong "China school" in Japanese authorities such as Foreign Ministry and the Justice Department and some MPs even in the "conservative" parties, not to mention both the Japan Communist Party and the Japan Socialist Party, that are said to be having some good "kickbacks" from the Chinese government. Having so much enjoyed those lucrative but ugly businesses, the profit-makers of both sides would have no intention to search for the truth of history. Never. The profits are too juicy and too many people involved for them to give it up altogether.
Finkelstein and other's struggle to reveal the truth and to change the situation to better one is, therefore, inevitably endless.
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Product Description
The last live broadcast on Polish Radio, on September 23, 1939, was Chopin's Nocturne in C sharp Minor, played by a young pianist named Wladyslaw Szpilman, until his playing was interrupted by German shelling. It was the same piece, and the same pianist, when broadcasting resumed six years later. The Pianist is Szpilman's account of the years in between, of the death and cruelty inflicted on the Jews of Warsaw and on Warsaw itself, related with a dispassionate restraint borne of shock. Szpilman, now 88, has not looked at his description since he wrote it in 1946 (the same time as Primo Levi's If This Is A Man?; it is too personally painful. The rest of us have no such excuse. Szpilman's family were deported to Treblinka, where they were exterminated; he survived only because a music-loving policeman recognised him. This was only the first in a series of fatefully lucky escapes that littered his life as he hid among the rubble and corpses of the Warsaw Ghetto, growing thinner and hungrier, yet condemned to live. Ironically, it was a German officer, Wilm Hosenfeld, who saved Szpilman's life by bringing food and an eiderdown to the derelict ruin where he discovered him. Hosenfeld died seven years later in a Stalingrad labour camp, but portions of his diary, reprinted here, tell of his outraged incomprehension of the madness and evil he witnessed, thereby establishing an effective counterpoint to ground the nightmarish vision of the pianist in a desperate reality. Szpilman originally published his account in Poland in 1946, but it was almost immediately withdrawn by Stalin's Polish minions as it unashamedly described collaborations by Lithuanians, Ukrainians, Poles and Jews with the Nazis. In 1997 it was published in Germany after Szpilman's son found it on his father's bookcase. This admirably robust translation by Anthea Bell is the first in the English language. There were 3,500,000 Jews in Poland before the Nazi occupation; after it there were 240,000.Wladyslaw Szpilman's extraordinary account of his own miraculous survival offers a voice across the years for the faceless millions who lost their lives. --David Vincent
Customer Reviews
Gripping yet fantasitc read., 17 Dec 2008
Well i have always been interested in the holocaust ever since i went to visit Anne Frank's house as a 12 year old girl. It really moved me yet didn't fully understand what the holocaust really meant or what had happened, yet I never forgot and since that day in Amsterdam I have followed documentaries intently and read around the subject.
Last year i decided i wanted, and needed to visit Auschwitz and I feel this is something everyone should do. I believe all school children should be taught about what happened there and we should never forget.
Visiting Auschwitz was a surreal experience and i felt as though i was walking round the set of a Hollywood movie. It is so surreal and hard to believe what happened there. It is beyond human comprehension the horrors suffered there, just over 60 years ago. I throughly enjoyed the visit and I mean that in a purely informative way. The visit brought me to tears and stays with you. There is so much to take in I would like to go back.
I will eventually get to my point!....
This book is a gripping read and a must for anyone who is interested in a first hand account of what actually happened there. I felt like i was living the experience with them and couldn't put it down.
Highly recommended and if you are thinking about visiting Auschwitz it is definatley worth the visit, there is lots of information on trip advisor about the best way to do it. Hope this helps xx
Disappointing, 15 Jul 2008
Truly the worst holocaust testimony ever written.So many mistakes throughout the whole text.Two examples of which were when Mr Muller mentions the camp orchestra in Birkenau,there was none, it was in Auschwitz 1.He also quotes that Kramer was in Birkenau and had came from Auschwitz 2.Both are one and the same place But important errors like these were repeated in every chapter and the worry for me is that Holocaust deniers may pick up on these simple blunders.Mr Mullers over use of adjectives and repetition of statements at times resulted in the book bordering on being boring.It read more like a students written essay who wasnt fully informed ,rather than an actual Holocaust survivors memoirs.Ive read many more imformative Holocaust testimonies and even Mr Muller must have been disappointed with the finished article.I tend to believe that the foreword said it all.
ochmister, 06 Jun 2008
Simple, one of the best books I have ever read. Very sad, sometimes un believable. But believe, this really happened and should not be forgotton. My respect goes to the author.
An account by somebody who witnessed everything first hand., 16 May 2008
There have been countless books written about Hitlers Final solution mostly by historians and occasionally by eyewitness survivors.
You can read account after account of conditions in the final months leading to the Russians eventual entry into the camp but few books will be as informative as this one written by camp Sonderkommando Filip Muller whose actual job was to operate the crematoria and dispose of the thousands of corpses.
During the latter half of 1944 an incredible 10,000+ were liquidated on a daily basis.This may appear too far fetched to comprehend at first but when you realise that those in command from Hitler right down to Himmlers eventual realisation that the war was turning against them a dramatic escelation in gassing took place until mass shootings were the norm and corpses were burnt round the clock in open pits.
At the height of the liquidation Berkenhau had over ten ovens working night and day resulting in a massive escalation of gassings.In early 1944,10,000 prisoners were murdered every day and there were sufficient ovens to cope with the huge number of bodies.
Filip was there as all this was going on and later as the mass of bodies became too overwhelming to cope with it was the Sonderkommandos duty to remove the rotting corpses for disposal in the ovens.
There are certain passages that will really make one think momentarily on the question of mans inhumanity towards his fellow man.
The arrival and first trial of mass gassings where under extream brutality men women and children were forced to undress knowingly they were facing certain death.
Possibly the most heart rending extracts are to be found on page 48 where Filip having discovered the arrival of his father at the camp has to cremate his body after his death from tythus.Fellow workmen working alongside him at the blazing ovens recite a prayer.
The book really brings the true barbarity of camp life to the reader.
The inhumanity of certain Kapos or team leaders given trusted duties by the SS who were extreamly sadistic beating fellow prisoners to death due to anger against what the SS were doing to their fellow countrymen.
Whilst reading the first two chapters one clearly realises these are the genuine testimony of somebody who lived on a daily basis where systematic murder was common place.Unless you witnessed at first hand you couldnot make up such testimony such as these.
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