culture
Literature
Book review
"Girl in a Blue Coat" may not be a shaky document, but it is excellent and important
The American Monica Hess chose to create a story that takes place in Amsterdam during the Holocaust.
The plot line is believable, evocative and thoughtful and full of insights, the characters are deep and the twists are surprising.
This is simply a good book
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Monica Hess
David Rosenthal
Friday, 22 October 2021, 10:00 Updated: 10:10
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In the heart of Amsterdam, on Plantazja Middenlan Street, lies the Dutch Theater. Since its construction in 1892, the building has been used for 50 years for what buildings of its kind are used for - staging plays and plays. In 1942, this cultural temple inevitably became one of the hardest and darkest monuments in the history of the country - it was the main facility for concentrating Jews and sending them to transit camps. 60,000 people passed through Schauberbach in the Netherlands, and if that sounds like a relatively small number, then it is about half of the Jewish population in the country at that time. More than 100,000 Dutch Jews, about 75 percent of their total population, perished in the Holocaust. The theater played a big part in that.
Schaubach is the key location in the novel "Girl in a Blue Coat" written by Monica Hess.
The year is 1943. Breastfeeding, a Dutch Christian girl, still mourns the recent death of a bass friend, who fell in battle for the defense of the homeland.
As a trader in the black market during a period of severe shortage, one of the customers, Mrs. Jansen, turns to her and asks her to locate a Jewish girl who hid and disappeared.
Breastfeeding hesitates to take on the task, but an encounter with a character from the past changes the picture and puts it in a twisting and fascinating vortex.
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Hesse, an American journalist, decided to write an in-depth investigation of a historical suspense novel that took place in the Netherlands. The benefit of the creative experience is not only hers but ours as well. The story is woven fictional though, but with a believable plot line, deep characters, surprising twists and lots of insights. Hess may not leave the influence of real-time writers like Hans Plade or Gunther Grass, but credibility is there and with it the identification, not only with breastfeeding but with the whole Dutch situation, many faces of which are less familiar.
So it turns out that "Girl in a Blue Coat" is just a good book.
Although she was not there herself in real time, Hess manages to sketch the feelings and criticism of some Dutch people towards themselves.
"After the war people will remember how they bravely rebelled against the Nazis, and no one will want to remember that their biggest 'revolt' was wearing carnation flowers in honor of the Diaspora royal family. Or maybe people will speak German, because the Germans will win," .
On the other hand, it is also difficult for her to blame them.
Based on their experience in World War I, they were convinced that they would be able to remain a neutral country this time as well.
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Puts us in the bowels of Amsterdam.
Cover "Girl in a Blue Coat" by Monica Hesse (Photo: Penn Publishing)
Breastfeeding is introduced to the theater at a fairly early stage. "It's disgusting, the way the Germans take beautiful things from us and poison them," she says without really knowing the magnitude of the horror. Only then does she go inside and express the dissonance well: "The smell hits me first. Sweat, urine and feces and another undefined stench ... What happened to this theater? The seats were uprooted from the floor and they are lying in piles ... The hall is dark, except for bright emergency lights like "Red eyes along the walls of the theater ... the heat is unbearable." With the practical innocence that would characterize each of us she says to one of the characters "I did not expect it to be like this", and responds: "How did you expect it to be? A hotel? A tea house? Crowds of people are held here for days with almost no proper toilets. The stage and they will perform a pantomime show? "
The simplistic thinking of breastfeeding is not unique to her. The way of dissonance between what represents such a clean cultural structure and the decay it really contains, is expressed in the mindset of the Dutch people, many of whom claimed even after the war that they did not know about Nazi crime and extermination camps. However, Hess was decent enough to give expression even to those who did know and did. 5,778 Dutch people are registered at Yad Vashem as Righteous Among the Nations, the second largest number after Poland. The author also depicts these figures, some of whom are completely unpredictable, and generally presents a comprehensive and beautiful picture of the ugliness of Amsterdam during the war.
Using the definition of "shaking document" is a bit excessive for me in this case, but it is still an excellent and important book.
To me he mentioned the excellent "City of Women" written by David Gilham in 2012.
This novel also takes place in 1943, at the center of which is a woman and it gives a tour of a different kind in a big city, in this case Berlin.
"Girl in a Blue Coat" manages to take us into the bowels of Amsterdam, show the many dark faces between its canals and create a fun reading experience with tons of food for thought.
"Girl in a Blue Coat" / Monica Hess.
From English: Gershon Giron.
Pen-Yedioth Books, 287 pages.
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