Synopses & Reviews
In the 1930s, thousands of people fleeing Nazi-dominated Europe found refuge in Latin America. But by late 1938, Bolivia was one of the few places in the entire world that was still accepting Jewish refugees; more than twenty thousand Central Europeans soon remade their lives there. Leo Spitzer examines, with exemplary subtlety and detail, the tension between memory and history that shows in their story: their European culture, their Jewish identities, their sense of displacement, and their experience of Bolivia's politics and society.
Review
"A curiously inspiring corner of Holocaust history: the story is of how culture and memory survive, and change, in the shock of new surroundings."--Adam Hochschild
"Evocative, thoughtful, and otherwise impressive . . . Vividly introduces readers to a little-known aspect of refugee history during the Holocaust."-Kirkus Reviews
"A form of doing history that offers fresh intellectual insights while touching the heart."--Ruth Behar, University of Michigan
About the Author
Leo spitzer was born in La Paz in 1939. Since 1969 he has taught at Dartmouth College, where he is now Kathe Tappe Vernon Professor of History. The author of two other books, he lives with his wife and children in Norwich, Vermont.