Role of the Individual in the Holocaust

Levi's Preface in Survival in Auschwitz almost off-handedly takes note of the significance of the individual in the day-to-day life-and-death decisions of the Holocaust. He speaks in that Preface of his "good fortune" in being sent to the concentration camp at the end of the war when "killings" were "suspended at the whim of individuals" (Survival 5). In other words, whatever the Nazis' claims that they were merely following orders, there were times when individual Nazis had the opportunity to decide not to kill without themselves being punished.

Also, if Levi believed the opposite to be true, he would not have written the books with the hope which he obviously holds for changing the minds of individual readers. In the poem which opens the same book, Levi addresses directly the individual readers in an attempt to reach them in their individual hearts and souls, referring to their houses, their hot food, their children. He offers these individuals a friendly warning that if they do not act in accordance with their freedom and with compassion for others less fortunate, they too may one day

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of certain death---is what encourages others to keep up hope that something can be done to fight the forces of evil and destruction, even if "merely" in a symbolic or spiritual sense. The author refers to a revolt of prisoners at another concentration camp. This is an event which emphasizes a number of central factors of the concentration camp experience. The individual is obviously severely limited with respect to his freedom. His range of potential action is not only limited, but almost certainly doomed. Nevertheless, a few hundred men at Birkenau, helpless and exhausted slaves like ourselves, had found in themselves the strength to act. . . . The man who is to die in front of us today . . . took part in the revolt. . . . The Germans do not understand that this solitary death . . . will bring him glory, not infamy " (Survival 135). There is no doubt whatsoever that Levi's response to the question of individual action and responsibility in the Nazi years is rooted in his own specific social and historical circumstances. Levi with much evidence at hand argues that his people, the Jews, have tasted the horror of man's inhumanity to man as no other people have. So horrible was their suffering during the Holocaust that even
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Some common words found in the essay are:
Tomorrow Survival, Survival Auschwitz, Holocaust Levi, Levi Jews', Fatherland Nazis, Auschwitz Reawakening, , York Collier, concentration camp, Germany Specifically, survival auschwitz, totalitarian regime, individual readers, story holocaust, york collier, concentration camp experience, camp experience,
Approximate Word count = 1373
Approximate Pages = 5 (250 words per page)