Response to a book I read yesterday

Dear Mr. Kurtz,


I have just spent the past four hours swept away by your three minutes (and much more!) in Poland.

Like you, I grew up in Long Island, in a cluttered house of a loving family, and like your grandparents, mine made it to America from Jewish Poland before the war, without seeing that WW2 was on its way.  Like you, I am a musician (by passion)...though by trade I am a teacher of middle school gifted students in central Jersey.

Recently, I found out that I would be one of 25 teachers worldwide invited to Poland to meet with Holocaust survivors and commemorate the 70th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz.  I'm honored...and emotionally all over the place. Sorrow, fear, horror, gratitude, connection--- so many feelings in such a short time since I found out the news.

As a scholar, I've learned to handle emotional overwhelm with learning...which led me to find out about your book. I watched the three minutes several times and imagined, wondered, pondered. Your book arrived in the mail today, and my paper-marking has remained undone as I sat on the edge of my seat transfixed by your intellectual and emotional process, by the people you met and the stories you told. I'm still waiting for the stories that will never be told--- the great silent rests-- the grand pause at the end of your written symphony--- the Never Again which resounds along with the photography's triumphant "forevermore."

Thank you for your research, your sharing, your rough conversations, your searches through parents' closets....

Thank you for your book.

I will take it with me to Poland this winter. When we have sessions talking about what life was like for the Jewish people before the war, I will hold it close to me.

My grandfather rarely talked about his childhood memories before coming to America. You help me imagine with more information than I had before.


Thank you!!!

Always, Emily Bengels