To wit: Bein Hamitzarim is a noble but insignificant book; Za Drutami Śmierci is a significant but ignoble book.
Bein Hamitzarim was ignored and forgotten. Not many in Israel in the early 1950s wanted to hear Bein Hamitzarim’s hard bleak truths; in that time and in that place the Jewish historical narrative was being forcefully bent toward heroism, bravery, resilience; what had happened in Europe was tragic, shameful, and best left unspoken. Later, after the Eichmann trial, after a sea change in public consciousness, after the deluge of books and films, Bein Hamitzarim was already long out of print. Bein Hamitzarim is probably best described as a carrier for Abraham Kajzer’s memory. Its protagonist isn’t a hero but a witness: “I feel the need to share, even if it’s just for myself, my own thoughts and insights, so that, when I am a free man, I can re-create it all again. But if I die, this poor diary will be my hand and memory.” Bein Hamitzarim is testimony, even if no one is listening.
Za Drutami Śmierci is very much alive, very much in print: the Museum of Gross-Rosen puts out an updated edition every year. The book is sold in the Riese gift shops, at Książ Castle, at other tourist sites across Silesia and beyond. Za Drutami Śmierci is valued, studied, dissected, and it is valued, studied, dissected for reasons that are if not contrary then certainly alien to Abraham’s authorial intentions—not for the hard bleak truths, its depictions of cruelty and suffering, but for its most incidental details. For the stuff in the far, far background, for what the average non-treasure-hunting reader would regard as crumbs of information—which worksites, which tunnel, what construction material. For the treasure hunters it’s an extractive read. Everything else can be skimmed and discarded. A passage wherein Abraham describes forced labor is important not for its depiction of brutality or subjugation but for the particulars of the labor. Za Drutami Śmierci is the textual equivalent of a treasure map. And in Za Drutami Śmierci Abraham is a hero, because he, regardless of what he thought he was doing when he jotted those notes on scraps of cement packaging, successfully preserved those crumbs of information. “I am amazed by my own stubbornness,” Abraham writes. “Who am I writing these notes in my diary for?”
Here is a passage the treasure hunters highlight:
In the face of our apathy, dejection, and determination, one needs to have a lot of cunning in order to identify and employ the right tactics. In any case, it will always be the tactics of a fly against a spider. You can try to explain yourself or take your punches silently, waiting for your assailant to tire. You can try to shout or, despite the repeated blows, grab a pickaxe and blindly chip away at the stones or the earth in front of you. In this situation, only the sharCN italess of the mind will save you from the massacre and so, to avoid it, everyone tries to keep their place. It’s not easy, since the companies constantly report different needs and each day the camp kapo forms the “kommandos” differently. There are a few companies that use our slave labor, namely: Sago and Werner, Seiden, Spinner, Lentz, the Bahnhof Kommando, and others.
The work is also incredibly diverse. Beyond the forest, in the mountains, is a huge Baustelle.
There are diggers, drilling machines, and borers here. All day long narrow-gauge trains run, carrying sand, gravel, crushed stone from the quarry, bricks, cement, and pipes. Lines run between construction sites, which are scattered in various places among the mountains.
Some groups work on putting in a sewage system. Standing ankle deep in water, at a distance of five meters from one another, the prisoners beat at the hard ground with pickaxes. Where the rock is exceptionally hard, a machine drills holes that are then filled with dynamite. After the rock is broken up, the group collects the stones by hand. Others are busy clearing the forest and removing tree trunks. The next group unloads wagons of cement. The same group works offloading stones from freight cars. The car is pushed to the edge of the mountain, where part of the group holds it steady so that it doesn’t fall into the ravine during unloading. After the stones are unloaded, they are pushed into the gorge with shovels. As it’s filled in, the track is laid along the newly formed edge using special mallets. Still another group unloads sand, which is offloaded here day and night for unknown purposes. Other teams are involved in the construction of new tracks—they lay rails and the foundation, prepare the ground, and drive piles. Others deal with unloading and laying brick or laying pipes. A group from Elektrica digs holes for electric wire. A dozen or so prisoners carry dirt from the freight car to fill the ravine. After being reloaded, one of the Häftlings [prisoners] is assigned to direct the car’s axle, pressing on it with a rod, after which the car, with its own weight, begins to roll down the slope in the direction of the ravine. Just before the ravine, the prisoner then applies force with the rod to stop the car’s momentum, calculating the exact distance by which the car travels right along the ravine’s edge. This work requires skill and a sharp mind. The smallest mistake can cause the car to fall, along with the man, into the ravine.
Here is another:
Today I worked in another group—with the Magyar [Hungarian], in the tunnels, in tunnel number 4. We are dismantling the tunnel equipment—we remove huge, long, heavy pipes. We bring them out and stack them in front of
