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This novel tells the story of Oskar Schindler, self-made entrepreneur and bon viveur who finds himself saving Polish Jews from the Nazi death machine. Based on numerous eyewitness accounts, Keneally's story takes place within Hitler's attempts to make Europe judenfrei (free of Jews).
- Early Life and Education
- Spy For The Abwehr
- World War II
- After The War
- Legacy
- See Also
- External Links
Schindler was born on 28 April 1908, into a Sudeten German family in Zwittau, Moravia, Austria-Hungary. His father was Johann "Hans" Schindler, the owner of a farm machinery business, and his mother was Franziska "Fanny" Schindler (née Luser). His sister, Elfriede, was born in 1915. After attending primary and secondary school, Schindler enrolled i...
Schindler joined the separatist Sudeten German Party in 1935. Although a citizen of Czechoslovakia, Schindler became a spy for the Abwehr, the military intelligence service of Nazi Germany, in 1936. He was assigned to Abwehrstelle II Commando VIII, based in Breslau.He later told Czech police that he did it because he needed the money; by this time ...
Emalia
Schindler first arrived in Kraków (Krakau) in October 1939, on Abwehr business, and took an apartment the following month. Emilie maintained the apartment in Ostrava and visited Oskar in Kraków at least once a week. In November 1939, he contacted interior decorator Mila Pfefferberg to decorate his new apartment. Her son, Leopold "Poldek" Pfefferberg, soon became one of his contacts for black markettrading. They eventually became lifelong friends. The same month, Schindler was introduced to It...
Płaszów
In fall 1941, the Nazis began transporting Jews out of the ghetto. Most of them were sent to the Bełżec extermination camp and murdered. On 13 March 1943, the ghetto was liquidated and those still fit for work were sent to the new concentration camp at Płaszów. Several thousand not deemed fit for work were sent to extermination camps and murdered; hundreds more were murdered on the streets by the Nazis as they cleared out the ghetto. Aware of the plans because of his Wehrmacht contacts, Schin...
Brünnlitz
As the Red Army drew nearer in July 1944, the SS began closing down the easternmost concentration camps and evacuating the remaining prisoners westward to Auschwitz and Gross-Rosen concentration camp. Göth's personal secretary, Mietek Pemper, alerted Schindler to the Nazis' plans to close all factories not directly involved in the war effort, including Schindler's. Pemper suggested to Schindler that production be switched from cookware to anti-tank grenades in an effort to save the Jewish wor...
As a member of the Nazi Party and the Abwehrintelligence service, Schindler was in danger of being arrested as a war criminal. Bankier, Stern, and several others prepared a statement he could present to the Americans attesting to his role in saving Jewish lives. After the liquidation of the Płasów camp, the Schindlerjudendecided to give Schindler a...
Films and book
In 1951, Poldek Pfefferberg approached director Fritz Lang and asked him to consider making a film about Schindler. Also on Pfefferberg's initiative, in 1964 Schindler received a $20,000 (equivalent to $189,000 in 2022) advance from MGM for a proposed film treatment titled To the Last Hour. Neither film was made, and Schindler quickly spent the money he received from MGM. He was also approached in the 1960s by MCA of Germany and Walt Disney Productionsin Vienna, but again nothing came of thes...
Schindler's suitcase
In 1997 a suitcase belonging to Schindler containing historic photographs and documents was discovered in the attic of the apartment of Ami and Heinrich Staehr in Hildesheim. Schindler had stayed with the couple for a few days shortly before his death in 1974. Staehr's son Chris took the suitcase to Stuttgart, where the documents were examined in detail in 1999 by Wolfgang Borgmann, science editor of the Stuttgarter Zeitung. Borgmann wrote a series of seven articles that appeared in the paper...
Copies of the list
In early April 2009, a carbon copy of one version of the list was discovered at the State Library of New South Walesby workers combing through boxes of materials collected by Keneally. The 13-page document, yellow and fragile, was filed among research notes and original newspaper clippings. The document was given to Keneally in 1980 by Pfefferberg when he was persuading him to write Schindler's story. This version of the list contains 801 names and is dated 18 April 1945; Pfefferberg is liste...
- Industrialist
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Quick Facts Author, Country ... The book tells the story of Oskar Schindler, a member of the Nazi Party who becomes an unlikely hero by saving the lives of 1,200 Jews during the Holocaust. It follows actual people and events, with fictional dialogue and scenes added by the author where exact details are unknown.
Schindler's Ark. Written by Thomas Keneally. Thomas Keneally’s remarkable, Booker-winning historical fiction about the unlikely hero who rescued thousands of Jews from the Nazi death machine. In the shadow of Auschwitz, a flamboyant German industrialist continually defies the SS and becomes a living legend to the Jews of Krakow.
Jul 9, 2022 · Thomas Keneally’s remarkable, Booker-winning historical fiction about the unlikely hero who rescued thousands of Jews from the Nazi death machine. In writing Schindler’s Ark, winner of the 1982 Booker Prize, Thomas Keneally found himself in the unique position of both author and archivist.
Feb 21, 2024 · Schindler’s Ark, Thomas Keneally’s 1982 book on which Schindler’s List is based. Courtesy of Hodder & Stoughton. The book, published in 1982 in England and Australia as Schindler’s Ark and ...
