Using Others Pain For Your Gain
I am shocked by the revelation that Misha Defonseca's book, "Misha: A Memoire of the Holocaust Years," was pure fiction, made up and then sold as a true story. People were so moved by this story, that it was "translated into 18 languages and made into a feature film in France."
http://www.cnn.com/2008/SHOWBIZ/books/02/29/holocaust.bookhoax.ap/index.html
According to the article, "Defonseca wrote in her book that Nazis seized her parents when she was a child, forcing her to wander the forests and villages of Europe alone for four years. She claimed she found herself trapped in the Warsaw ghetto, killed a Nazi soldier in self-defense and was adopted by a pack of wolves that protected her... Defonseca acknowledged the story she wrote was a fantasy and that she never fled her home in Brussels during the war to find her parents...Defonseca says her real name is Monique De Wael and that her parents were arrested and killed by Nazis as Belgian resistance fighters..."
As someone who not only teaches the Holocaust, but has studied it extensively, participated in seminars at the National Holocaust Museum in Washington, D.C., traveled to Germany and visited Dachau, and works tirelessly to educate my students about tolerance, I find this story absolutely revolting.
MILLIONS of people were affected by the Holocaust. To take this truth and create your own fiction around it and then make money off that fact is beyond understanding.
How do you ever fully take ownership of something like this? It's impossible for this author to re-pay all of the money she has made from her imagination. But would that be enough?
Think of how bad her publishing company and agent must feel. They were led to believe that the story they were told was historically accurate and true. A woman gave her word and it was taken.
Her word it seems was worthless.
To lie about something as horrific as the Holocaust is an insult to everyone who truly experienced it. People paid for their beliefs, lifestyles, political affiliations and career choices with their lives during the Holocaust. To say that you lost something also, when you were never that unfortunate, is terribly disturbing.
http://www.cnn.com/2008/SHOWBIZ/books/02/29/holocaust.bookhoax.ap/index.html
According to the article, "Defonseca wrote in her book that Nazis seized her parents when she was a child, forcing her to wander the forests and villages of Europe alone for four years. She claimed she found herself trapped in the Warsaw ghetto, killed a Nazi soldier in self-defense and was adopted by a pack of wolves that protected her... Defonseca acknowledged the story she wrote was a fantasy and that she never fled her home in Brussels during the war to find her parents...Defonseca says her real name is Monique De Wael and that her parents were arrested and killed by Nazis as Belgian resistance fighters..."
As someone who not only teaches the Holocaust, but has studied it extensively, participated in seminars at the National Holocaust Museum in Washington, D.C., traveled to Germany and visited Dachau, and works tirelessly to educate my students about tolerance, I find this story absolutely revolting.
MILLIONS of people were affected by the Holocaust. To take this truth and create your own fiction around it and then make money off that fact is beyond understanding.
How do you ever fully take ownership of something like this? It's impossible for this author to re-pay all of the money she has made from her imagination. But would that be enough?
Think of how bad her publishing company and agent must feel. They were led to believe that the story they were told was historically accurate and true. A woman gave her word and it was taken.
Her word it seems was worthless.
To lie about something as horrific as the Holocaust is an insult to everyone who truly experienced it. People paid for their beliefs, lifestyles, political affiliations and career choices with their lives during the Holocaust. To say that you lost something also, when you were never that unfortunate, is terribly disturbing.