About this item
The long-hidden diary of a young Polish woman's life during the Holocaust, translated for the first time into EnglishRenia Spiegel was born in 1924 to an upper-middle class Jewish family living in southeastern Poland, near what was at that time the border with Romania. At the start of 1939 Renia began a diary. "I just want a friend. I want somebody to talk to about my everyday worries and joys. Somebody who would feel what I feel, who would believe me, who would never reveal my secrets. A human being can never be such a friend and that's why I have decided to look for a confidant in the form of a diary." And so begins an extraordinary document of an adolescent girl's hopes and dreams. By the fall of 1939, Renia and her younger sister Elizabeth (ne Ariana) were staying with their grandparents in Przemysl, a city in the south, just as the German and Soviet armies invaded Poland. Cut off from their mother, who was in Warsaw, Renia and her family were plunged into war.Like Anne Frank, Renia's diary became a record of her daily life as the Nazis spread throughout Europe. Renia writes of her mundane school life, her daily drama with best friends, falling in love with her boyfriend Zygmund, as well as the agony of missing her mother, separated by bombs and invading armies. Renia had aspirations to be a writer, and the diary is filled with her poignant and thoughtful poetry. When she was forced into the city's ghetto with the other Jews, Zygmund is able to smuggle her out to hide with his parents, taking Renia out of the ghetto, but not, ultimately to safety. The diary ends in July 1942, completed by Zygmund, after Renia is murdered by the Gestapo.Renia's Diary has been translated from the original Polish, and includes a preface, afterword, and notes by her surviving sister, Elizabeth Bellak. An extraordinary historical document, Renia Spiegel survives through the beauty of her words and the efforts of those who loved her and preserved her legacy.
About the Author
Renia Spiegel was born in Uhry?kowce in Tarnopol province on June 18, 1924, the daughter of Rose and Bernard Spiegel. Bernard Spiegel was a land owner of an estate during this time. Renia's younger sister by six years, Ariana, was a child star and by the age of 8 was performing on the famous stage of "Cyrulik Warszawski". She was featured in numerous films shot before the outbreak of the Second World War, including a part in director, Michael Waszy?ski's film, Renia starts her diary in January 1939. At the outbreak of war, Renia is 15 years old. Together with her sister, Ariana, she stays in Przemy?l with their grandparents. Renia writes moving poems which are sometimes featured in the school newspaper. She also writes a series of poems in a hand-illustrated and beautifully bound booklet. Her diary mainly describes her loneliness living in war-torn Poland without a mother, her first love (she kisses her boyfriend for the first time four hours before the Nazis invaded the Soviet Union) , and everyday life during the Soviet and then German occupations. The diary describes her fears and terror during the creation of the ghetto in Przemy?l. She writes of the humiliation she experiences first-hand and witnesses on the streets of Przemy?l. She writes up until the last day of her short life. She is shot on the street of the ghetto a week after her 18th birthday. This nearly seven hundred-page journal by Renia Spiegel, which spans the years 1939 to the summer of 1942, presents a powerful insight into the life of a young woman, whose life was tragically cut short shy of her eighteenth birthday. The diary is an eyewitness account of the horrors of day-to-day life during the Nazi occupation. There is incredible maturity in her observations and insights. Her account of her personal life is poignant, heart breaking, and often amusing with her expression of adolescent infatuation exposing the raw emotion of a teenager. This powerful diary is not only a primary historical source of the Holocaust, but also a true and outstanding work of literature.