Clara's War: One Girl's Story of Survival

by: Clara Kramer with Stephen Glantz

Published by: Harper Collins

Reviewed by Lauren Segelbaum

Clara’s War was published on Holocaust Remembrance day–a day where we teach the world we must never forget. Clara’s War is an important contribution to this lesson. Written by Clara Kramer with Stephen Glantz, this memoir is the story of Clara, a Polish Jewish teenager, during the Second World War.

When the Nazi’s invaded their small town, Clara’s family and two other families were taken in by the Becks. Mrs. Beck was the family housekeeper and Mr. Beck was a womanizer and a vocal anti-Semite. They built a bunker where a total of 18 people lived for almost two years. During this time Clara kept a journal of her life. But unlike Anne Frank, Clara–now 81 years old–is able to recount her life in person and has dedicated her life to speaking about the Holocaust.

I have read many books on the Holocaust. While reading this memoir I tried to separate what made this book different for me. Clara, with the assistance of Stephen Glantz, transports you back sixty years to the bunker where she lived. At times while reading I felt like I was suffocating because the details of their cramped space were so vivid.

I think what I found so amazing throughout this book was the continuation of their religious life. On page 73 Clara describes the decision to bring the Torah to the house where they lived and keep it safe. She writes, “Only someone like my father who was an Orthodox Jew and lived his religion with every breath could understand what having this Torah near us would mean.” During their time in the bunker the families celebrated Passover and Yom Kippur, the Jewish Day of Atonement because Clara’s father “kept the calendar with religious commitment.”

The other parts of this memoir talk about the death of Clara’s sister, Mr. Beck’s love affair with one of the family members and the many German soldiers who lived above the bunker. You wanted this book to end because you wanted them to be free.

Read it and remember the six million Jews who did not survive.

Armchair Interviews agrees.