Born in The Hague in 1937 Emmie Arbel and her Jewish family were deported by the Nazis in
1942. As a child she survived the Ravensbrück and Bergen-Belsen concentration camps. When the
war was over she was eight years old. Her parents and grandparents were murdered in the
Holocaust. But her own rescue turns out to be the beginning of a new path of suffering for the
traumatized child. Emmie Arbel looks back on a childhood and youth marked by violence abuse
speechlessness and loneliness. But also a life full of rebellion self-empowerment and humor.
Based on numerous in-depth conversations with Emmie Arbel Barbara Yelin has created a haunting
memoir that is also a reflection on memory itself. Edited by Charlotte Schallié and Alexander
Korb
