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Emilie Schindler
showed us an intriguing glimpse at the shadow world between
memory and legend - her husband Oscar
Schindler became a household name as one of the great
humanitarians of the century, saving more than 1,200 Jews from certain
death in Hitler's death camps during the second World War.
While Oscar Schindler's efforts to save hundreds of Jews are
well known thanks to Thomas Keneally's book and the Spielberg movie Schindler's
List, the silver-screen version left Emilie Schindler on the
sidelines. An unsung heroine.
A German-language book Ich,
Emilie Schindler by the Argentinean author Erika Rosenberg
tries to show that Emilie Schindler was just as involved in shielding Jews
from the Nazis.
The biography highlights Emilie Schindler's bravery during the
Holocaust and portrays her not only as a strong woman working
alongside her husband but as a heroine in her own right. Erika
Rosenberg, a journalist who befriended Emilie Schindler many years
ago, wrote the book to fulfill one of the old widow's last
wishes, to tell her story and to correct a historical oversight.
Oscar
Schindler
For Emilie Schindler, the book was about finding peace. As Erika
Rosenberg says: "She's looking for recognition. Not in the form
of money, but recognition for her service ... to be the same like
her husband."
For the last five decades of her life Emilie Schindler led a
modest existence in her little house in San Vicente 40
kilometers south-west of Buenos Aires with her cats, her dog and
the beautiful roses. Only the uniformed Argentinean police
disturbed the idyll - they were posted to protect Emilie from
anti-Semitic and ultra-Conservative extremist groups ...
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