The Librarian of Auschwitz: The heart-breaking Sunday Times bestseller based on the incredible true story of Dita Kraus

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Her blissful childhood ended abruptly before she turned ten. In March 1939 the Nazis invaded Prague and started restricting the lives of Jews. Within a month her lawyer father lost his job and the family were evicted by Germans, who demanded the flat for themselves. During these years Iturbe has also been a postgraduate professor at the Master of Cultural Journalism at the Universidad Autónoma de Madrid and the Master of Edition at the Universidad Autónoma de Barcelona. He has given lectures as a guest-professor in the faculties of Journalism at the Universidad Blanquerna, Universitat Oberta de Catalunya and at the Universitad Abat Oliba. Dita’s father Hans died of starvation at the camp aged 44. In July 1944, Dita and her mother were among 1000 women sent by Mengele to a work camp in Hamburg. From there she was sent to Bergen-Belsen. “Even without gas chambers, the camp was a horrific killing machine, where the starving prisoners died by the thousands.” The sudden death of her mentor Fredy in March 1944 was traumatic for the children. Informed of the impending mass murder on March 8 1944, Fredy was asked to lead an uprising. Shortly after, he was found in a coma from an overdose of sleeping pills. Dita learned much later that Jewish doctors, worried about his safety, had drugged him to avoid conflict, but misjudged the dose.

Librarian of Auschwitz: The heart-breaking Sunday Times The Librarian of Auschwitz: The heart-breaking Sunday Times

It wasn't an extensive library. In fact, it consisted of eight books and some of them were in poor condition. But they were books. In this incredibly dark place, they were a reminder of less sombre times, when words rang out more loudly than machine guns...' She has featured in books herself. Alberto Manguel mentioned her “clandestine children’s library” in his book about the great libraries of the world. This piqued the interest of Spanish writer Antonio Iturbe who wrote The Librarian of Auschwitz, a semi-fictionalised version of Dita’s story, based on many conversations. An English translation is now available, published a few months ago.By 1941 they were evicted again from the rented flat where they lived with her grandparents. By now they were squashed into a room in an apartment shared by another family in the part of the city which in the past had been the Jewish ghetto.

The Librarian of Auschwitz: The heart-breaking Sunday Times

After graduating, he created the free magazine Gratix, which he directed and, after taking part in various short media projects, in 1993 got into being the chief supervisor of the supplement television of El Periódico. Subsequently, he became editor of cinema-magazine Fantastic Magazine.

The only title Dita can remember is A Short History of the World, by HG Wells, in Czech. Her friend, Auschwitz survivor Ruth Bondy, who recently passed away, also remembered a geographical atlas and something by Sigmund Freud. Another survivor friend, Eva Merova, says there was a book of short stories by Czech writer Karel Capek. Educators would borrow books to teach the alphabet to the younger children. “As there were no pencils or papers to make notes I had to remember who took what at the end of each day.” It’s been nearly seventy-five years since Dita’s number 73305 was tattooed on her arm in Auschwitz-Birkenau. The digits may have faded but the memories have not. She pulls up her sleeve to show us the faded digits, turning to the children, instructing them to share her story with others. She told us of the carefree childhood she’d had in a secular home. Until she was eight she didn’t even know she was Jewish. “When I was in second grade, I found a piece of paper on my desk with the words, ‘You are a Jew’. I went home and asked: ‘Mum, what is a Jew?’ She explained that people have different religions, Christians, Protestants and Jews in Czechoslovakia. I said: ‘And we are Jews?’ The answer was a simple ‘yes’.” Fredy, then aged 27, was an inspirational educator who created a small oasis of relative normality within the death camp. Dita had known him from her childhood in Prague, where he was her sports instructor. She had met him again in the Terezin Ghetto, where he was running the department for youths and children at the Jewish ghetto administration. Find sources: "Antonio Iturbe"– news · newspapers · books · scholar · JSTOR ( November 2022) ( Learn how and when to remove this template message)