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Album with a flower patterned cover, loose weave cotton fabric. Includes sentences in different languages such as English, Latin, French, Italian, German, Czech, Slovakian, and Serbian, 5.1 x 4 cm.
On this page, you can read
“It is the end that puts the dot on the i” and
“Do your best, don’t regret – do no harm, don’t give up!”
A notebook with collection of camp poetry, 20.5 x 17 cm, includes an alphabetized diagram of titles of camp poetry from different camps collected by different people.
Latin textbook written from memory in Ravensbrück 1943 by Wanda Madlerowa, green cover, 22x15 cm.
Letter or poem from Irena K., Ravensbrück, December 1942, 23.5 x 18.5 cm.
“And the mother’s heart beats constantly…
The evening comes and the western sky is colored purple-red
The flaming sun hides behind the burning cloud –
Flooding over as gold, glowing in the rays of light, the delightful colors.
They spread out
Over the heaven
Roll call in the camp. The sirens wail wildly.
Masses of women immediately stop – thousands of women
A murmur, the sound of a thousand languages
Suddenly quiet. Roll call has begun.
During heavenly morning redness
You wait for something, the heart stops.
Again the threatening hand is lifted as a ghost
Somewhere behind the wall ends the Book of Life.
The book is short, full of pain
Today a new group of women are led to uncertainty.
Half naked, barefoot, closed off from life.
Silent ranks.
Despite the morning redness of the sky, the SS men stand there
So brave they are, they stand there with their weapons ready to kill!
So honorable to shoot at such a goal – against women,
defenseless, degrading!
Then comes the roar!
First a volley of shots, then just single shots.
With tears, their Book of Life is closed, so full of dreams
That will never become real.
The mother’s desire, all her thoughts go west.
She thinks of her daughter.
And the mother’s heart beats constantly,
Shivers, tears…”
Printed map in Berlin newspaper.
Traced map of Germany, Poland, Switzerland and Belgium.
Sketch of maps of Fürstenberg, Berlin, Rostock and Lübeck.
Traced and hand-drawn map of Soviet Union and Ukraine.
Traced map of France and Belgium.
Traced map of Normandy.
Traced map of Belgium and the Netherlands.
Traced map of France and Luxemburg.
Traced map of northern France.
Traced map of northern France, Belgium, and the Netherlands.
A paperbound booklet containing handwritten poetry by among others Verlaine, Ronsard, and Bauderlaire, 9.5 x 7 cm. On this page you can read:
On this page you can read:
Meditation
“Be wise, O My Sorrow, calm yourself
You asked for the evening, it falls, it is here.
A dusky air surrounds the town
bringing peace to some, and worry to others.
Lashed by Pleasure, that merciless torturer,
while the servile crowd of humanity
To gather remorse in mindless rejoicing.
Give me your hand, o Sorrow; Come with me, far from them
See the dead Years leaning against us
wearing worn-out dresses on the balustrades of the skies
See how Regret, grinning, rises from the depths of the sea
And the dying Sun goes to sleep in the archway.
And like a shroud being dragged from the East,
Hear, the approach of the soft Night, my dear,”
A notebook with collection of camp poetry, 20.5 x 17 cm, includes an alphabetized diagram of titles of camp poetry from different camps collected by different people.
A paper wallet, 15 x 10 cm.
A book with black wax paper, contains a prayer to Saint Antonius, 10.5 x 8.5 cm.
Calendar with spine made of newspaper, 7.5 x 5.5 cm.
A little notebook covered in black synthetic silk, 3 x 3 cm, contains the handwritten poem “If” by Rudyard Kipling.
“If you can dream but not makes dreams your master
if you can think but not make thoughts your aim
if you can forget triumph and disaster
and treat theses imposters just the same
if you can bear to hear the truth, you have spoken
twisted by knaves to catch the fools
or watched everything your soul attain, broken
stoop and build them again with worn-out tools”
"You have to understand that we had to escape reality when we came back to the barracks after a work day. We traveled in our imaginations to another world. It was a dream."
/ Maria