Morning Book Study

Etty Hillesum: A Life Transformed

by Patrick Woodhouse

 

3-Part Series (Tuesdays, March 6, 20, 27)

 

On 8 March 1941, a 27-year-old Jewish Dutch student living in Nazi-occupied Amsterdam made the first entry in a diary that was to become one of the most remarkable documents to emerge from the Nazi Holocaust. Over the course of the next two and a half years, an insecure, chaotic and troubled young woman was transformed into someone who inspired those with whom she shared the suffering of the transit camp at Westerbork and with whom she eventually perished at Auschwitz. This book explores Etty Hillesum's life and writings, seeking to understand what it was about her that was so remarkable, how her journey developed, how her spirituality was shaped, and what her profound reflections on the roots of violence and the nature of evil can teach us today.

This book study is in partnership with Ballet Austin’s Light/The Holocaust & Humanity Project with the goal to convene the city in a conversation promoting human dignity and coexistence using art and education to facilitate a public dialogue through a study of the Holocaust and genocide so that we may consider our personal responsibility to injustice in the world today.