Where Memory Leads by Saul Friedländer

Saul Friedländer is mostly known for his acribic search for the historical truth into the Vatican Archives, particularly in connection with the WWII, but it is always interesting to explore the life history of the historian. Where Memory Leads is the second installment of his life historical account, exploring his identity post-Shoah as well as its relatively less known relationship with Israel, Germany, France - his cultural identity remains French - and his country of adoption, US.

'I am a Jew, albeit one without any religion or tradition-related attachments, yet indelibly marked by the Shoah. Ultimately, I am nothing else'. He, like the founding fathers of the State of Israel, he belongs to a generation of action, secular and aimed to create an identity shaped by the Shoah. An heritage that still needs to be explored and analysed although meanwhile, a new generation of Jews and Israeli made the choice for a dramatically different identity. '(...) the only lesson one could draw from the Shoah was precisely the imperative: stand against injustice, against wanton persecution, against the refusal to recognize the humanity and the rights of 'the others''. As many of his generation, he is for the 'two state solutions' and refuse to understand the new religious fervor who sees as an alienation from the founding meaning of the state. Interestingly, he just doesn't want to understand the new process, either historically or sociologically, it just rejects it as alien. 

But the book is more than an essay about Israel, and this saves it when the reader might have a different political opinion. It is a book about growing up and coping with the lost of parents, about the lost childhood memories and a life broken into too small little pieces that can hardly come back together. It is equally a testimony of old times, of a different era that the less survivors are the more difficult to understand it. 

Friedländer also writes about life fragility and fears, about personal life decisions and growing out of love. A book worth to read, regardless one's opinions about the current situation in Israel, because it is written with passion and love, although the ideals and visions may differ dramatically. 

Disclaimer: Book offered by the publisher in exchange for an honest review