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The Drowned and the Saved

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"The Drowned and the Saved" is the final book of Primo Levi (1919-1987), a Jewish-Italian chemist who survived the death camp of Auschwitz, and turned to authorship in his later years. This book is a group of a half-dozen related essays, each exploring a specific aspect of Levi's view of the Holocaust's causes and effects.

He begins with the concept of "good faith", wondering whether believing a lie excuses it. He notes that oppressors lie to save themselves from believing they are evil, and victims lie to save themselves from believing they suffer. He explores the moral zone between black and white, noting that anybody can be a tough killer or a foolish victim: we are all tyrants and victims in our own way.

He examines survivor's guilt, and reflects on the roles of luck versus blessing in life, and discusses the ways humans need communication to survive, including the way victims bend language to disguise their intentions, and tyrants twist it to cause confusion among their victims.

He tries to distinguish between rationalized evil and collective madness. He believes the spirit and mind can be injured just as the body can, and wonders how a person's perspective plays a role in their survival and psychological health. He describes the various stereotypes people hold when they imagine the stories of those who lived through WWII, e.g., the romantic hero, the evil Nazi, the prisoner who always plots escape, and so on, but explains why they are rough and inaccurate.

Each chapter is like a conversation with an intelligent and qualified author. It is thoughtful, and a pleasure to read. It reflects on psychological and historical themes which are important not only to our understanding of the Holocaust, but also more generally human nature. (It appears to be a rumination on subjects discussed in his other books, collected and summarized briefly here.) It is for this reason that the book is successful. It considers the Holocaust in particular, but its themes are actually deeper and more universal.

"Letters from Germans", the penultimate chapter, is the book's most powerful, noticeably demonstrating the tension between his memory of that time period, and the memory of various Germans, in their own words. He especially berates those who believe they are doing the right thing by speaking out in shame and guilt over theit past, perhaps attacking them a bit harshly, but certainly with justification. The last chapter, "Conclusion", is its weakest. In the opinion of this reviewer, it over-generalizes, and tries to apply retrospective analysis to the world's future. It also calls for unwarranted conclusions, unrelated to the preceding chapters, and perhaps contradicts itself. Luckily it is brief, and does not detract from the excellence of the prior explorations.

(For example, he says war is unecessary, and mankind can settle all conflicts around a table, but only as long as we are in good faith. He then calls Hitler a buffoon, implying he cannot be taken in good faith. He next says we need not have good faith to negotiate if we are all equally in fear of war, but this sounds like he is saying war is necessary after all, even if only to remind us there are punishments for negotiation in bad faith!)

Despite its conclusion (which many readers will probably enjoy, despite this reviewer's belief it over-reaches), the book is an intelligent and even-handed, but personal assessment of the Holocaust, written in an engaging and intelligent style, with brevity and wit. At 200 pages, it is easy to read. Packed with philosophy and insight, it is worth the investment.

The Drowned and the Saved is the haunting last-word meditation of the late Primo Levi on his Auschwitz camp experience. Describing his 1987 work as a collection of "considerations" rather than distinct memories, the thoughtful Levi nevertheless attempts to maintain--as much as possible--the spirit of the Auschwitz truth inevitably eroded, enhanced, or otherwise altered by the passage of 40 years and the flaws of memory: He writes in the first chapter ("The Memory of the Offense") that this later work is still considerably informed by and in concert with the substantial Holocaust literature of the "submerged" (i.e, the perished) and the "saved" that has accumulated since the publication of his 1947 memoir Survival in Auschwitz. But Levi writes, the submerged are the true, albeit lost, witnesses. Only imperfect witness of the monstrous Holocaust experience is available from the saved, like himself.

In The Drowned and the Saved, Levi provides a discerning and articulate exposition of the psychological and sociological peculiarities of the Auschwitz camp--ideas virtually unexplored in popular literature and movies. Throughout the work, he discusses the collective responsibility of nonvictims (in his view, the entire German population) and of the moral dilemmas that arose in a horribly victimized, imprisoned community that was wildly pluralistic (in nationality, language, religion, education, trade, and individual personality). (Tensions between the disparate concepts of collective and individual responsibilities are mostly implicitly explored and not fully crystallized, however, by the author.) Levi explains the complex hierarchy and moral "gray zone" among Auschwitz prisoners who severely compromised humanitarian considerations for fellow inmates and supported the camp's illogical infrastructure to improve survival. Deep anguish befell the unfortunate intellectual who attempted to make sense of his utterly nonsensical existence.

In "Shame," "Communicating," and "Useless Violence," Levi expatiates the Nazi perpetration of its systematic dehumanization, from the moment of transport to complete demoralization entrenched shortly after arrival. The explanation is necessary for the contemporary reader to understand later the feelings of absurdity (or even offense) aroused in the Auschwitz survivor when faced with the external world's disbelief that escape and revolt were not often thought of, much less attempted. In Auschwitz, escape and revolt did occur, to be sure, but infrequently and more often among the better fed and less severely victimized prisoners who were multilingual (most were imprisoned in a foreign country). And failed attempts were invariably countered by the SS's extremely public and vicious brands of individual and general punishment.

Levi concludes his reflective work by presenting selected letters from ignorant and/or apologetic Germans after publication of his 1947 memoir (which the reader is advised to read beforehand). Finally Levi warns of the repetition of a kind of Auschwitz, if the core memory of it and the German responsibility for it are not maintained. But even Levi's reflective considerations of this peculiar historical hell are difficult, if not impossible, for the contemporary reader without direct connection to the Holocaust to know fully or hold onto. Periodic re-reading of Levi's writing is therefore recommended.

How can I begin?

Primo Levi died in spring 1987, in a still unclear accident (someone say a suicide) in his Turin house - few hundred yards from where I lived at the time, and not far away from where I'm writing now. I don't really know if he really killed himself (he didn't leave any note, and staircase rail was low, very low) but I know that his last book ("The Drowned And The Saved") is a book that trasceend any human notion of absolute, unblinking truth.

Primo Levi was a men obsessed by truth. He lived trough one of the most extreme experience a XX century's man could live - one year in Auschwitz. After coming back home, he resume is life as a chemistry expert (he was the director of a small company). He became a writer almost by chance. He was urged to tell the truth about the Holocaust - not the trascendental, nobilitating, almost religious experience movies like "Schindler's List" had make us believe, but something horrible, degrading, a donward spiral in a world where only the worst survive - and the best, the good people, the one deserving survival, die. It called it "the grey zone". It wrote that he came back because he was lucky, because he compromised with the lager system (altrough what saved him was only being a chemistry graduate in a death camp that needed chemistry experts to produce synthetic rubber). He tried, in the mosth unflinching and direct way, to tell the world that being an Auschwitz survivor wasn't a badge of goodness. Actually, it was exactly the reverse.

In "If This Is A Man" (his memories of Auschwitz), he wrote about his experience in a neutral, documentary style. Thirty years laters, he returned (for the first and last time) on the subject. And what he did was writing a small, focused, terryfing insight in something he tried to understand in his whole life: how was possible? How did someone get out of it? Will it happen again?

Primo Levi was an optimist, but he was a realist too. He basically believed in his fellow humans. But he could get away with the inner feeling that the very existence of Auschwitz was - basically - a contradiction of everything that's worth in life, a cancer that had contamitated everything that had come afterward - the drowned AND the saved, the butchers AND the victims. Nothing is spared, nothing is kept in the background: betrayal, collaboration, compromise, degradation, evil, the gray reality of Auschwitz. "The Drowned And The Saved" is the wall against whom any "negationist" lie simply vaporise - you can't deny it, you can't downplay it. It's a technical book on the killing joke humanity did on itself, and Primo Levi, without laughing, admitted that the joke was on him.

Simply - he didn't changew the rules of the game when he felt it was going to lose it.

Levi was an Italian Jew who survived the Holocaust despite incarceration in Auschwitz. THE DROWNED AND THE SAVED is his final book, and it is not so much about the events of the Holocaust themselves as it is about how we have come to remember and understand the Holocaust, the most horrific crime in human history, the author persuasively argues. Levi's book exposes the pitfalls of human memory, exploring the nature of history, asking how we might honestly represent to posterity crimes that are literally unspeakable. By taking a modest but crucial step back from the actual crimes, Levi holds up for his reader's examination both the need for and the limits on our already somewhat distanced historical perspective on the Holocaust. Levi was worried about the myths and metaphors that had already attached themselves to the Holocaust within his lifetime, stylized intellectual ivy already obscuring the ruined walls of recent history. THE DROWNED AND THE SAVED attempts to clear away this overgowth, to preserve the ruin as starkly, as nakedly, as might still be possible

I write this mostly for the previous reviewer, but also for those who might be made uneasy by it. Primo Levi is the most precise author I have ever read. He has made a glimpse of the Holocaust available to those of us who never had the misfortune of being submerged in it. He has made real what he himself said would be harder and harder to grasp for others as the years go by. I write this partly due to his call and the call of so many other survivors that we now must bear witness for them. It sounds a little sappy and overly melodramatic, but there will be a time when only the students of the Holocaust and the books and media created concerning it will remain. We must remind students and our youth of the banality of evil and the ease in which hatred can run wild. Anyone who desires proof of this need only look at the school violence that pervades our lives every year. Some of the answers of how "useless violence" comes about are found in these pages.

Instead of reporting just the "what" Levi explains the "how" and "why" the Holocaust carried out so efficiently. He explains the life in the Lager, the endless roll calls, and the pointless work that existed for the sole purpose of humiliation. He defines the "gray zone" in which survival from the Holocaust was achieved only by participation in it. He explains that survival had a price and that the honest and good were the first to perish. Levi tells us this from the perspective of a survivor trying to understand, a scientist reasoning a problem soundly, only passing judgement on those that he has an explicit right to. Primo Levi also makes known the profound changes that occurred before, during, and after the ordeal to him and others and his work is not without this reflection. He points out the similarities of more current events in our world today. Levi also tells us that an atrocity like this can happen again but does not have to.

More than any author of fiction or nonfiction I have found Levi's books fascinating by the wisdom they contain. Each idea is succinct. Every story is relevant to a deep understanding. To say that you are not at all the wiser after reading this book is only to say that you did not read the book. You did not think about what it says about us as human beings and what we are capable of.

I read this book in college and I just finished reading it again tonight. It is, I can honestly say, the best education I received. It is my hope that if you do read this book, you will think about what it says, because the words are true.

Levi's final account of his year at Auschwitz is concise, to-the-point, and absolutely fascinating. Words simply cannot do it justice; even four decades after the camps were "liberated," Levi's experience during the war remains for him (and to us) an exposed nerve. While Levi is unremitting in his condemnation of the Nazis and those Germans who stood silently by as unthinkable atrocitites were committed in their backyards, this book is evidence of a mind that, up until the very end, was still probing, still trying to understand, still offering up meaningful and timely questions which every human being--regardless of age or nationality or religion--should seriously ponder. The most striking aspect of this short narrative is its utter sincerity--Levi does not reach for hyperbole (though it's hard to exaggerate the inhumanity of the concentration camps), nor does he meditate at length on abstruse philosophy; to the contrary, he is always painfully, even brutally, honest and straightforward. His death was a great tragedy, but his written legacy is an even greater triumph; The Drowned and the Saved should be required reading for all.

This is a book that causes the reader to reconsider, reflect critically one's own views, marvel at the level of depravity to which humans can steep, and is one which I imagine should be a standard text in ethics courses.

But it also raises questions of memory and the mind"s ability to adjust, amend and retool. Mr Levi must stand as one of that sad century's most astonishing examples of positive human achievement .

I read this book every year, usually just before summer. Though none of us can ever get a true grip on the full meaning of the Shoah, I have found that repeated readings of "The Drowned and The Saved" both drown me in horror and save me from narcissim. A great man, a great writer, a horribly Timed life, a Terrible death, the best...Primo Levi!

It is redundant to praise this book or describe its background, which has been done very well by other reviewers. This was Levi's final wrestling with the implications of what he called the Lager (he didn't use the term 'Holocaust'), not only as he experienced it, but more generally.

Just a few points that may be less obvious. Levi never uses the phrase "survivor guilt," and his choice of terms was never without consideration. Rather, he uses the term, "shame." The chapter that goes by that name is an enormously subtle and evolving one. Levi continues to probe the feeling as he recalls it after "liberation," and there are at least five different concepts of what that "shame" entailed, no one of which did Levi think was definitive. By the way, none of Levi's definitions are the same as the popular notion of "survivor" guilt - that one feels guilty simply for having survived while others did not. The closest he comes is to talk about surviving "in place of another," which is a more complex idea. It refers specifically to the nature of the camps themselves, a horrific "laboratory," as Levi put it, in which selections, influence, luck and more did mean that one's survival always came at someone else's cost. This is a sociological point. It would not the case, for example, for the survivor of a tornado or earthquake.

Second, the "grey zone" is very often misinterpreted to suggest that perpetrators and victims met in some "middle ground" somewhere. Levi is definitive about this. The responsibility of the killers and the victims are in no sense, and in no context, equivalent. But in the squalid and horrific world that was the lager, there was an enormous range of types and characters. Levi is arguing mostly against what he calls "stereotypes" - convenient simplifications.

Finally, it may be of interest that "the drowned and the saved" was intended by Levi to be the title of his first book, If This is a Man (known in the U.S. as Survival in Auschwitz). His publisher disagreed, although there is a chapter in If This is a Man called Drowned and Saved. Levi's preoccupation with the role in the camp of differences in power, privilege, luck, and alliances-of-convenience runs throughout his work. It is a topic that still deserves much more attention than it has received.

Primo Levi suggests that perceiving the experiences of others is extremely difficult and grows more so as the distance in time, space, and quality increases. "We are prone to assimilate them to 'related' ones, as if the hunger in Auschwitz were the same as that of someone who has skipped a meal, or as if escape from Treblinka were similar to an esacpe from an ordinary jail."

If you are now living in an affluent democratic society, the book leads you to wonder, "Would I recognize the warning signs? If I were a victim, would I descend into barbarism? If I were not, would I have the courage to speak on their behalf? Would I become a monster?"