When Memory Comes [Paperback]

Saul Friedlander (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 1991

Four months before Hitler came to power, Pavel Friedländer was born in Prague to a middle-class Jewish family. In 1939, seven-year-old Pavel and his family were forced to flee Czechoslovakia for France, but his parents were able to conceal their son in a Roman Catholic seminary before being shipped to their destruction. After a whole-hearted religious conversion, young Pavel began training for priesthood. The birth of Israel prompted his discovery of his Jewish past and his true identity. Friedländer describes his experiences, moving from Israeli present to European past with composure and elegance.

The Wisconsin edition is not for sale in the British Commonwealth or Empire (excluding Canada.)

--This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Friedländer undertakes an evocative journey into his past that is likely to leave many a reader shaken."—Amos Elon, New York Times Book Review

"A beautifully written (and beautifully translated) memoir of a tragic childhood."— New Yorker

"A work of eloquence and compassion."—John Skow,Time

    "A tender elegy which moves from the Israeli present to the European past, from fear to memory, in a mosaic of Proustian images."—New Republic

"The most remarkable feature of When Memory Comes is its composure, an elegance that is unnerving. Friedländer describes his experiences in lean, graceful sentences; his language seems armored against the dissolution it describes."—Leon Wieseltier, The New York Review of Books

--This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.

Language Notes

Text: English, French (translation) --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback
• Publisher: Noonday Pr (May 1991)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0374522723
• ISBN-13: 978-0374522728
• Product Dimensions: 7.9 x 5.1 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 7.2 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,284,194 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars powerful memoire, April 12, 2008

By 

gollytwo (Keene, NH, USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: When Memory Comes (George L. Mosse Series in Modern European Cultural and Intellectual History) (Paperback)

April 2008 - I read this book when it was first published. A very beautifully written and translated memoire of a Jewish boy raised as a Catholic in order to save him from the Nazi death camps.