Petr Ginz (M / Czechia, 1928-1944), Holocaust victim
Petr Ginz (M / Czechia, 1928-1944), Holocaust victim.
- The editor-in-chief of the magazine Vedem
- KEYWORDS : <Czechia> <Theresienstadt> <Auschwitz>
Eva Ginz / Eva Ginzová (F / Czechia, 1930), Holocaust survivor
- KEYWORDS : <Czechia> <Theresienstadt>
Biography
Petr Ginz was born in Prague in 1928. His mother did not have a Jewish background, but moved to Prague into her husband's Jewish family. Peter attended the Jewish elementary school in Jáchymová street. During this time he fell in love with books, especially the novels of Jules Verne. Later he started to write his own short stories and novels, illustrating them himself.
On 24 October 1942 he was included in transport Ca, and since he had reached the age of 14, he went to Terezín by himself. Together with other boys, he was accommodated in block L 417 (the former Terezín school). Shortly after his arrival, he and other boys began to publish a magazine called Vedem, in which he was able to make use of his exceptional talent and imagination. As well as editing the magazine, he wrote articles, poems and introductory columns for it, and drew illustrations. He often paid for articles from other contributors using food that his family sent him in packages. He also kept a diary every day. Before he left for Auschwitz he gave his diary to his sister Eva, who was two years younger and thus did not come to Terezín until 1944. She lived to see the camp's liberation. A large number of the magazines from 1942-1944 have also been preserved, together with some of Petr's drawings.
On 28 September 1944 Petr Ginz was transported to Auschwitz, where he died.
Petr's sister, Eva, was born in Prague in 1930. She also arrived at Theresienstadt, but survived as she was not deported to Auschwitz.
Book : '"The Diary of Petr Ginz (2007)
- Petr Ginz, The Diary of Petr Ginz (New York, NY: Atlantic Monthly Press, 2007). English trans.
The diary was written by Holocaust victim Petr Ginz in 1941-1942 (age 12-14), while living in Prague under Nazi rule, before being deported to Theresienstadt and Auschwitz.
"Lost for sixty years in a Prague attic, the secret diary of a fourteen-year-old prodigy who later died at Auschwitz describes with keen insight into Jewish life the increasing horror of his situation but also reveals a brilliant, droll teenager with a hunger for life."--Publisher description.
"The diaries of Petr Ginz, a 14-year-old Czech Jew who died in Auschwitz in 1944, resurfaced in 2003 after nearly 60 years in obscurity. Now edited by his sister, the diary covers 11 months preceding Ginz's deportation to the Theresienstadt concentration camp. The entries, along with poems and artwork, demonstrate the young man's determined spirit, imagination and intellectual precociousness. With much that is mundane about his life in Prague—the weather, visits with family and friends, school assignments and grades—the diary also reveals Ginz's prankish and entrepreneurial sides (he initiates a school lottery) and his observations of resistance against the German occupiers and their acts of savage reprisal. Ginz also records the progressive deportations of those he knows to either Theresienstadt or to the Lodz Ghetto. This volume also includes excerpts from Vedem ("we lead"), a weekly periodical Ginz created in Theresienstadt. Pressburger's helpful, if at times sketchy, notes and annotations to the diary include a summary of the fates of Ginz's family, neighbors, schoolmates and friends. While Ginz's diary lacks the expressions of the rich inner life of Anne Frank's, it is a moving and valuable addition to the personal literature of the Holocaust."--Publisher description.