The Devil's Arithmetic
by Jane Yolen
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Book Summary Information
Author: Jane YolenEdition: Mass Market Paperback
Audio: English (Published)
Published: 2000
ISBN: 0590965786
Number of pages: 170
Publisher: Scholastic
Book Reviews of The Devil's Arithmetic
Book Review: A very moving account of the realities of the Second World War in Eastern Europe
Summary: 5 Stars
It continues to astound me that there are people who deny The Holocaust. In some sense I can understand it because it is so difficult to believe that such a thing could have been done as a part of official state policy. Nevertheless, the documentation is so overwhelming that the people who deny it look like pathetic fools.
This story describes the events in one of the camps, but from a unique perspective. Hannah is a young girl living in New Rochelle, New York in modern times. She is with her family and they are going to a Passover service at the home of her elderly relatives that survived the camps. Hannah is a bit rebellious, growing tired of the rituals and wishing she were elsewhere.
Everything changes when Hannah opens the door as a symbolic gesture to let the Prophet Elijah into their home to take part in the ceremony. Suddenly, she is now Chaya, a Jewish girl in Eastern Europe during the Second World War. Shortly after she arrives, the Jews in their shtetl are rounded up, packed into railroad cars and shipped off to a death camp. Her life then becomes a daily challenge to survive.
Like all the others in the camp Chaya is now being slowly worked and starved to death, looking over at the smoke rising from the crematoriums and knowing what it means. Her "time" at the camp ends when she is with four friends and a guard comes over and says he must select three of them to be killed. After all, he has a daily quota that must be filled.
Suddenly, she is Hannah once more and she looks at her Aunt Eva and she can explain the meaning of the tattoo on Eva's arm. Furthermore, she recognizes her Aunt Eva and Grandpa Will as people she knew in the camp. This realization changes her outlook on her Jewish heritage as she now has firsthand knowledge of what took place.
This book is very moving and descriptive of those terrible times. The perspective is always that of a young girl, although she grows up very fast once she arrives at the camps. It should be required reading for all middle school children. While some may object to the depictions of brutality, the history of the human race is not pretty, and the best way to avoid the ugliness is to understand the consequences.
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