Book Reviews

Escaping Hitler: A Jewish Haven in Chile
A New Work by Eva Goldschmidt Wyman




I'm happy to let you know that my mother's new book, Escaping Hitler, A Jewish Haven in Chile, published by the University of Alabama Press, is now available.

In Escaping Hitler, my mother, Eva Goldschmidt Wyman, tells her family's story, and that of thousand of others, who escaped from Nazi Germany to Chile in the 1930s and 1940s, a time when the Chilean Nazi party was active in Chile's major institutions.
 
The book is based primarily on interviews with German Jewish refugees, family correspondence, and research in German and Chilean primary sources from the period. It begins with an intimate account of Jews in Germany in the 1930s as conditions for Jews deteriorated.

My mother recounts Kristallnacht in Stuttgart, where her father was principal of the Jewish school, his imprisonment in Dachau, and his release and immigration to Great Britain. Escaping Hitler details our family’s escape from Nazi Germany and subsequent life in Chile, providing an intimate look at daily life on the steam ship Conte Grande during the voyage from Italy to Chile in 1939, as well as Nazi espionage and anti-Semitic activity in Chile and the Nazi influence in South America in general.
 
Recounted in an intimate and personal style, Escaping Hitler immerses the reader in an extraordinary chapter of contemporary Jewish history both inside Germany and South America. It is an augmented translation of her earlier work in Spanish, Huyendo del Infierno Nazi: La Inmigración Judio-Alemana hacia Chile en los Años Treinta (Santiago, RIL, 2008).

Escaping Hitler brings new material to the English speaking audience and as such is a contribution to Holocaust history. It is a fascinating and informative read presenting a well-researched and well-documented story of German Jewish refugees in Chile and their complicated encounters with German and Nazi immigrants.”—Steven B. Bowman, author of The Jews of Byzantium, 1204–1453.

Please order Escaping Hitler, A Jewish Haven in Chile today from your jobber, local independent bookstore, or favorite online chain.

For other works in Holocaust and Jewish Studies, please browse our online stock of over 12,000 related titles at danwymanbooks.com.


Product Details

  • ISBN-13: 9780817318000
  • Publisher: University of Alabama Press
  • Publication date: 7/26/2013
  • Pages: 232
  • Product dimensions: Hardbound. 5.90 (w) x 9.10 (h) x 1.00 (d)


Eva Goldschmidt Wyman was born in 1934 in Stuttgart, Germany, and emigrated to Chile in 1939 and to the United States in 1965. She earned an MA in Latin American and Spanish Literature from the University of Washington, Seattle. Her publications include, Los Poetas y El General: Voces de oposición en Chile bajo Augusto Pinochet, 1973–1989 / The Poets and the General: Chile's Voices of Dissent under Augusto Pinochet, 1973–1989; Huyendo del Infierno Nazi: La inmigración judio-alemana hacia Chile en los años treinta.

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