They'll Never Believe It Happened

30 years ago, on the 50th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz by the Red Army, a survivor of the camp told Michael Goldfarb, 'One day they will never believe it happened'. As soon as the conflict ended it became the task of artists to ensure that the industrial slaughter of European Jewry was never forgotten. How well have they succeeded?

In this first episode, Michael describes how growing up safe in America in the 1950s with no direct connection to Auschwitz, other than the fact of being a Jew, the Holocaust became a part of his identity. When he was assigned to report from the camp on the fiftieth anniversary of its liberation, he had to find a way to dissociate himself from this imagined world of horror and just see the reality of the place.

Michael Goldfarb looks at how artists have tried to memorialise what happened at Auschwitz

Essays from leading writers on arts, history, philosophy, science, religion and beyond.

On the 80th anniversary of the Liberation of Auschwitz, Michael Goldfarb looks at how artists have tried to understand and memorialise what happened at Auschwitz.

[LISTEN NOW]

30 years ago, on the 50th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz by the Red Army, a survivor of the camp told Michael Goldfarb, 'One day they will never believe it happened'. As soon as the conflict ended it became the task of artists to ensure that the industrial slaughter of European Jewry was never forgotten. How well have they succeeded?

On the 80th anniversary of the Liberation of Auschwitz Goldfarb looks at how writers, filmmakers, and poets have over these decades succeeded or failed in the almost impossible task of understanding and memorialising what happened at Auschwitz and in other places in the terrible three and a half years of the Shoah.

Cultural critic Theodore Adorno said writing poetry was 'barbaric' after Auschwitz. Polish Nobel Laureate Wisława Szymborska proved him wrong. Michael looks at her life and the handful of poems in which she distilled the essence of what happened: the randomness of survival, the curse of a Jewish name, and the inevitable erosion of memory into poetic language that is anything but barbaric.

Michael Goldfarb looks at how artists have tried to memorialise what happened at Auschwitz

Essays from leading writers on arts, history, philosophy, science, religion and beyond.

On the 80th anniversary of the Liberation of Auschwitz, Michael Goldfarb looks at how artists have tried to understand and memorialise what happened at Auschwitz.

[LISTEN NOW]

30 years ago, on the 50th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz by the Red Army, a survivor of the camp told Michael Goldfarb, 'One day they will never believe it happened'. As soon as the conflict ended it became the task of artists to ensure that the industrial slaughter of European Jewry was never forgotten. How well have they succeeded?

On the 80th anniversary of the Liberation of Auschwitz Goldfarb looks at how writers, filmmakers, and poets have over these decades succeeded or failed in the almost impossible task of understanding and memorialising what happened at Auschwitz and in other places in the terrible three and a half years of the Shoah.

Upon arrival at the camps in Germany, Allied commanders insisted the sights they saw be filmed. Among the images a bulldozer pushing emaciated corpses into a massive open grave. The horror is still impossible to believe. How can filmmakers hope to compete with that? Michael looks at the three French directors - Alain Resnais, Marcel Ophuls and Claude Lanzmann - who decided that the only way to tell the story was through documentaries: And wonders if any of the more recent generations of filmmakers, have been able to succeed in visualising the horror.

Michael Goldfarb looks at how artists have tried to memorialise what happened at Auschwitz

Essays from leading writers on arts, history, philosophy, science, religion and beyond.

On the 80th anniversary of the Liberation of Auschwitz, Michael Goldfarb looks at how artists have tried to understand and memorialise what happened at Auschwitz.

[LISTEN NOW]

30 years ago, on the 50th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz by the Red Army, a survivor of the camp told Michael Goldfarb, 'One day they will never believe it happened'. As soon as the conflict ended it became the task of artists to ensure that the industrial slaughter of European Jewry was never forgotten. How well have they succeeded?

On the 80th anniversary of the Liberation of Auschwitz Goldfarb looks at how writers, filmmakers, and poets have over these decades succeeded or failed in the almost impossible task of understanding and memorialising what happened at Auschwitz and in other places in the terrible three and a half years of the Shoah.

Upon arrival at the camps in Germany, Allied commanders insisted the sights they saw be filmed. Among the images a bulldozer pushing emaciated corpses into a massive open grave. The horror is still impossible to believe. How can filmmakers hope to compete with that? Michael looks at the three French directors - Alain Resnais, Marcel Ophuls and Claude Lanzmann - who decided that the only way to tell the story was through documentaries: And wonders if any of the more recent generations of filmmakers, have been able to succeed in visualising the horror.

Michael Goldfarb looks at how artists have tried to memorialise what happened at Auschwitz

Essays from leading writers on arts, history, philosophy, science, religion and beyond.

On the 80th anniversary of the Liberation of Auschwitz, Michael Goldfarb looks at how artists have tried to understand and memorialise what happened at Auschwitz.

[LISTEN NOW]

30 years ago, on the 50th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz by the Red Army, a survivor of the camp told Michael Goldfarb, 'One day they will never believe it happened'. As soon as the conflict ended it became the task of artists to ensure that the industrial slaughter of European Jewry was never forgotten. How well have they succeeded?

On the 80th anniversary of the Liberation of Auschwitz Goldfarb looks at how writers, filmmakers, and poets have over these decades succeeded or failed in the almost impossible task of understanding and memorialising what happened at Auschwitz and in other places in the terrible three and a half years of the Shoah

In America, the years after the war saw a flowering of literature by Jewish writers like Philip Roth, Joseph Heller and Saul Bellow. None wrote directly about the Holocaust. It took 25 years before Bellow gave it a go in Mr. Sammler's Planet. The first and most enduring works of literature were written by those who lived the Shoah and survived it. This essay looks at Primo Levi and Vassily Grossman, both knew the horror of the Shoah first hand. Levi, was a prisoner in Auschwitz. Grossman, whose mother died in a mass execution in Ukraine, was the first journalist to file a report from a Nazi death camp. Both tried to fictionalise the horror.

Michael Goldfarb looks at how artists have tried to memorialise what happened at Auschwitz

Essays from leading writers on arts, history, philosophy, science, religion and beyond.

On the 80th anniversary of the Liberation of Auschwitz, Michael Goldfarb looks at how artists have tried to understand and memorialise what happened at Auschwitz.

[LISTEN NOW]

30 years ago, on the 50th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz by the Red Army, a survivor of the camp told Michael Goldfarb, 'One day they will never believe it happened'. As soon as the conflict ended it became the task of artists to ensure that the industrial slaughter of European Jewry was never forgotten. How well have they succeeded?

On the 80th anniversary of the Liberation of Auschwitz Goldfarb looks at how writers, filmmakers, and poets have over these decades succeeded or failed in the almost impossible task of understanding and memorialising what happened at Auschwitz and in other places in the terrible three and a half years of the Shoah

In America, the years after the war saw a flowering of literature by Jewish writers like Philip Roth, Joseph Heller and Saul Bellow. None wrote directly about the Holocaust. It took 25 years before Bellow gave it a go in Mr. Sammler's Planet. The first and most enduring works of literature were written by those who lived the Shoah and survived it. This essay looks at Primo Levi and Vassily Grossman, both knew the horror of the Shoah first hand. Levi, was a prisoner in Auschwitz. Grossman, whose mother died in a mass execution in Ukraine, was the first journalist to file a report from a Nazi death camp. Both tried to fictionalise the horror.

Michael Goldfarb looks at how artists have tried to memorialise what happened at Auschwitz

Essays from leading writers on arts, history, philosophy, science, religion and beyond.

On the 80th anniversary of the Liberation of Auschwitz, Michael Goldfarb looks at how artists have tried to understand and memorialise what happened at Auschwitz.

[LISTEN NOW]

30 years ago, on the 50th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz by the Red Army, a survivor of the camp told Michael Goldfarb, 'One day they will never believe it happened'. As soon as the conflict ended it became the task of artists to ensure that the industrial slaughter of European Jewry was never forgotten. How well have they succeeded?

On the 80th anniversary of the Liberation of Auschwitz Goldfarb looks at how writers, filmmakers, and poets have over these decades succeeded or failed in the almost impossible task of understanding and memorialising what happened at Auschwitz and in other places in the terrible three and a half years of the Shoah.

Time passing is an essential underpinning of much narrative art. Playing with time has been at the core of a number of works of literature and cinema of those born long after Auschwitz was liberated. In this final essay, Michael looks at how the passage of time shapes memory and has slowly allowed writers like Martin Amis, Jenny Erpenbeck and filmmakers like Jonathan Glazer to reinterpret and re-tell the story of what happened in Auschwitz.

Michael Goldfarb looks at how artists have tried to memorialise what happened at Auschwitz

Essays from leading writers on arts, history, philosophy, science, religion and beyond.

On the 80th anniversary of the Liberation of Auschwitz, Michael Goldfarb looks at how artists have tried to understand and memorialise what happened at Auschwitz.

[LISTEN NOW]