Review of No Time for Patience
No Time for Patience by Zev Birger is a memoir of a young man�s struggle to survive through another day in a concentration camp. By getting in depth about his experience and also providing sufficient background information, Birger draws the reader into his story.
Zev Birger and his family planned out their lives. It was as if their lives were a large mosaic, with all the pieces fitting just right. However, with the sudden, unexpected invasion of the Nazis into Lithuania, Birger and his family find their lives filled with confusion and disarray. Off the bat Birger�s family is forced to live in a ghetto. They soon wish that they could go back to the ghetto when they are forced to be sorted and crammed into cattle railway cars.
In the first chapter Birger questions, �First, why had I kept silent?� He answers his own question with more questions. �If someone were to come to you and tell you that they had gone through such things, wouldn�t you think they were hopelessly exaggerating? Wouldn�t you think it unfathomable that a human being could have been subjected to such horrendous experiences and survived?�
Birger�s first chapter is very interesting and keeps the reader wanting to continue reading. However, although the second chapter contains a lot of good background information, it also contains many unnecessary and somewhat uninteresting details which detract a bit from the story. He flashbacks to so many childhood memories, and it makes the reading longer and boring. Although the second chapter was not the most interesting, the details of the concentration camps and conditions in the fifth chapter make it all worth the wait. Birger talks about being numbered, labor working to survive, and starving most of the time as well.
When the Jews were being sorted, Birger�s mother was separated from the rest of the family. �Throughout the journey to Germany, which lasted several days, I was haunted by the picture of my mother standing there with her hand raised high, imploring, �You at least stay alive!� It is an image that has not left me to this day.� It is assumed and most likely that she was killed.
While everyone in the camp was forced to go on a death march, Birger and his acquaintance, Schimek, hide under piles of straw. Upon smelling a burning odor, Birger realizes that the Nazis have set the place afire to get rid of evidence of the camp. Dragging the exhausted Schimek out of hiding, the two encounter soldiers dressed in clothes they do not recognize. �They looked different from SS men. They wore unfamiliar uniforms and drove vehicles I have never seen before. These were American soldiers in jeeps. We were liberated! It was April 27, 1945.� The liberation of Birger and his acquaintance is a climax to the story. Much of what happens after his liberation is a denouement, and is not as interesting as the events which led to his freedom. However, the following chapters were not painful to read.
Tying back to Birger�s mother saying at least for Birger to survive, Birger was the only one in his family that did survive through the holocaust. This memoir would most likely be appropriate for an older audience of readers. If the reader is too young and immature, he or she most likely will not understand the depth of this memoir and the horrific reality of Birger�s experiences. People who would most like this memoir are people who like to read about a survivor�s holocaust experience. If the reader cannot stand to read about many unfortunate events happening to one person, he or she will most likely not enjoy reading this memoir.
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� Annie Kim 2005