World War II

""This article examines policies and public attitudes concerning the issue of Soviet and Nazi genocides in Ukraine after the 'Orange Revolution'. The central question is whether such factors as regional political culture affect contemporary policies and public attitudes towards these important historical issues. The article uses a 2008 survey conducted for this study by the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology to analyse determinants of public attitudes concerning the question of whether Soviet and the Nazi policies were genocidal. It finds that regional political culture is the most significant factor affecting policies and attitudes towards the Soviet genocide in Ukraine.

Europe-Asia Studies, 62, 6, 2010, 973-997""

"A partnership between Margaret River Press and Arts Margaret River, this compelling collection of new writing from Australian writers emerged from the inaugural 2011 Margaret River Short Story Competition. The competition consisted of an Open Category and a South West Category.

Beverley Lello’s winning entry in the Open Category, Things That Are Found in Trees, is a first person narrative that draws the reader in from the opening sentence: “I opened the newspaper today and saw a photograph of a dead elephant calf marooned in a tree by floods in Sri Lanka.”

This is the first ‘thing’ found in a tree within the story. The focus then shifts to the past and memories of an event that occurred when the narrator was seventeen. Central to the story is an event all too familiar in the lives of young men in rural Australia. But this is not a maudlin story. The writing is restrained, respectful and, wears its symbolism lightly.

Second prize open category entry, Christine Piper’s Stranded is a tightly written story set in Japan. The main character, Mr Takeda, is having an affair with a young woman not much older than his daughter. This is a very economical story with a strong sense of character and place. In spite of the ending, there is very little sense of moral judgement: in this world, surface is everything.

The stories in the book “are insightful, sensitive stories, wide-ranging in their interests and, I believe, deeply rewarding. In all of them, there is ‘something new’ for us to discover.”, Richard Rossiter, Editor."

"This thesis explores the history of one German family during World War II, using
the inspiration and background knowledge gained from historic scholarship and literature to create narratives closely following actual experiences and memories to help understand the peculiarities of war narrative and war memory. The sources are interviews with relatives, existing literature on the subject matter, and the writer’s imagination."

"“This paper looks into the role of voices in a propaganda film made by inmates of a  concentration camp in the last year of the War. Commissioned by the SS the film intended  to show the good life of the Jewish inhabitants of Theresienstadt. The documentary film  records their speaking, shouting and singing in German and Czech. However, one voice  does not belong to an inmate—it was added to the soundtrack in the final cut of March  1945 and belongs to the German narrator. This voiceover suggests that Jews live well in  German camps.  Other German films shot in ghettos or camps have no original sound—they rely on the  ideological voiceovers. This makes the Theresienstadt film an exception. The camera be-  nevolently records the faces and voices of the inmates that later in the final cut will be  exploited. These images and sounds were provided by people, the majority of whom by that  time had been sent to the Auschwitz gas chambers. This filmmaking procedure is completely in line with the cynical Nazi concept of maximum utilisation of the Jewish prisoners, even after their death.  For Czech audiences the soundtrack of the film is ambiguous : The voiceover, discordant  with the independent meaning of the original recordings. In particular the voices of the  children singing a Czech song were an attempt at resisting the intentions of the final cut of  the film.”
Contents:
1. Memories and Histories of the Camp and Its Media
2. Messages from the Camp : Postcards and “Kassibers”
3. The Unique Case of Recorded Voices from a Concentration Camp
4. Strategies of Deception 1943 – 45 : Theresienstadt as the Friendly Camp in the Heart of Europe
5. About the Production of the Film and its Intended Audience
6. Authorship in the Film and Two Layers of Sound Recordings
The Chronologically Last Layer : Lampl, the Reticent Narrator
The Chronologically Earliest Layer
7. Music Recordings for the Film in 1944 and 1945
8. Diegetical Elements in the Sound-Mix
9. Messages of the Recorded Voices"

"Abstract

The main aim of this research project is to investigate the power of theatrical storytelling and image over children’s everyday lives, examining theatrical performances by and for children in the Theresienstadt ghetto during World War II.
The historical research develops based on the unique case of the ‘model ghetto-town’ of Theresienstadt (Terezín) in former Czechoslovakia, which, being neither a ghetto neighbourhood within a city nor a concentration-extermination camp, is recognised today as a huge ‘workshop’ where all manner of art was developed under occupation. This study focuses on children’s theatrical creation and explores the dynamics of theatrical action, storytelling and scenography in children’s lives under these specific coercive conditions. The elements of theatrical performance produced by and for the young inmates in the ghetto are documented by original diary entries, notes, posters, drawings and archival testimony from survivors, as well as by a series of original interviews with Theresienstadt survivors conducted as part of this study. The research provides the first detailed documentation of children’s performances in Theresienstadt as well as an in-depth analysis of the staging of the two main children’s productions staged between 1941 and 1945: the opera Brundibár and the dance-musical performance Little Fireflies.
The researcher’s own artistic identity as a scenographer has been a key element defining the point of view of this study, which also explores how a theatrical/visual metaphor can express the ineffable. Furthermore, the interaction between reality and fantasy through theatre providing ways to experience and deal with reality with the support of our imagination is investigated. The effects of theatre on the children of Theresienstadt are examined from four points of view, i.e. from a cultural, educational, sociological and psychological perspective, arguing theatre as a means of enhancing freedom of spirit, as well as enriching children’s upbringing.
The thesis concludes with a contemporary evaluation of the research results pertaining to this part of European cultural and theatrical history, pointing to the important function of theatre as a motivating power providing spiritual support in life.
"

"Young Austrian writers who made a debut fell a few years after World War II found themselves in a rather complex situation: on the one hand, there were the war reminiscences extensively articulated and debated in contemporary literature; on the other hand, important themes concerning the future Austrian state and society began to emerge. This dissertation presents narrative works of the "young generation", published after 1945, which not only attempted to come to terms with war-time experiences but also to provide a frame of reference for understanding of the individual, as well as society's, participation in National Socialism and the implications. This work centers also on ways of presenting - in literature - the moment of transition from a war to a post-war identity. It concentrates, thus, on literary diagnoses and hypotheses regarding the new post-war Austrian identities formulated on the basis of Nazi and war experiences. The study sets the "young post-war generation's" literary narratives against the background of public, political and historical discourses thematizing the post-war Austrian identity in the Austria of the 1950s and 1960s.

Unmittelbar nach dem Ende des Zweiten Weltkriegs meldet sich in Österreich eine neue Generation von Schriftstellerinnen und Schriftstellern zu Wort. Geboren ungefähr zwischen 1920 und 1926, erlebten sie den Krieg als einen gewaltigen Einschnitt. Die vorliegende Arbeit analysiert Nachkriegsromane der jungen Generation, die sich auf das Problem der Teilnahme des Einzelnen und der Gesellschaft am Krieg und am Nationalsozialismus beziehen. Die Auseinandersetzung mit der Vergangenheit erweist sich im generationellen Querschnitt als nicht frei von Ambivalenzen und Widersprüchen. Zugleich erfolgt jedoch eine kritische Internalisierung des Nationalsozialismus in das Kontinuum der österreichischen Geschichte. Aus dieser Perspektive können österreichische Gründungsmythen der Nachkriegszeit literarisch verifiziert werden. Die Analyse literarischer Diskurse der jungen Generation innerhalb anderer öffentlicher, v. a. historischer und medial-politischer Diskurse zur österreichischen Nachkriegsidentität, die in den 50er und 60er Jahren stattfanden, ist eines der Hauptanliegen dieses Buches."

"This essay traces the history, current state, and potential future of comparative literature. The great expansions have coincided with aspirations for international understanding. The term first emerged after the Napoleonic wars. The field soared in the late 19th century, became a discipline after the Second World War, and experienced its most vigorous growth (of departments and programs) in the U.S. during the Vietnam War.

Comparative literature has always worried its supporters as well as its skeptics. At the same time it has experienced a constant crisis within. In each episode it has responded by enlarging its purview and self-definition. Thus in the late 20th century it transcended the European literatures that had long been its bedrock to embrace East-West literary and cultural relations in ever-broader outward orbits, encompassing eventually first Edward Said's orientalism, then Homi Bhabha's deconstructivist postcolonialism, and finally Gayatri Spivak's eclecticism. The models that served during the extended pax americana seem poorly suited to terrorism, war, and globalization. Supranationalism cannot be lightly readjusted to fit transnationalism. But comparative literature can and will survive, so long as balances persist between theory and practice, so long as interdisciplinarity does not come at the cost of disciplinarity, and so long as the indivisible relationships uniting humanism, humanities, and humaneness are not forgotten. While comparative literature retains its emphases on language-training and critical skills, and while it satisfies desires of students to transcend boundaries culturally, interpretatively, and otherwise, it will not only always remain alive but even often thrive."

Joe Levin (January 24, 1919-March 9, 2009) served in World War II in Africa and Italy. After earning a law degree and being drafted, Joe was with the 17th Bomber Group in North Africa, Italy and France. He was the adjutant of the 34th Bomb Squadron of that Group and ran the Group's newspaper. After the war, he returned to suburban Washington, DC and became an accountant. His death notice can be seen at http://bottledmonsters.blogspot.com/2009/03/my-friend-joe-levin-has-died.html