This book from bnpublishing contains serious multiple errors, sometimes five per page, that disrespect the author and the Holocaust and force the reader to stop and try to figure out the author's real meaning. Book is full of incorrect or missing punctuation (such as periods), words and names spelled different ways from one sentence to the next, random capitalization, run-on sentences, grammatical and spelling errors in English, French, and German. "Figfit" is not a word. Neither are "infaticable," "aroupd," or "mochery." The phrase is "flash of intuition," not "flask." The sign over every concentration camp was "Arbeit Macht Frei," not "Fret." You say, "avec moi," which means "with me," not "avec mot" which means "with word." Phrases like "there were no dark cold air had the smell" (p. 107) stop the reader dead. Very disrespectful of the author and the subject. Levi was a brilliant man with astounding powers of observation and recall for his hellish experiences. His words deserve to be preserved better than this.

Excellant book, I felt like I was living Mr Levi's life in the camp with him. What a wonderful story of survival.

A monotone, sort of scientific voice. His story is sad...but is told with very little emotion. It was hard to get into - a little harder to read due to the "scientist' type voice that I'm not used to. I found Elie Weisel's "Night" to be a much more candid look inside a survivor's haunted soul. Primo Levi is good for someone who prefers reading something about the Holocaust that is a bit more textbook vs. memoir.

A touching, but not mawkish or dramatic, memoir. One realizes the randomness and happenstance by which he survived, and easily accepts the moral dualism of the life of thievery and connivance, within bounds of common decency and collective group self-interest, that kept any survivor alive. Some reviews seemed to fault the book for being unemotional, but one sees how Levi's essentially scientific and objective personality became a key to his survival, and necessarily informs his voice.

This account of the imprisonment, internment, survival of Primo Levi in Auschwitz is written as a straightforward chronological narrative. Levi recounts his initial capture , the horrendous suffering of the journey of Italian Jews to Auschwitz, the selection there in which all the woman and children were immediately sent to their deaths in the gas- chambers, and in which the able- bodied sent to the work- camp at Buna. Levi tells the story , detail by detail of his getting into the work- order of the Camp. He describes in clear precise language the horrible humiliations the prisoners were subject to. He also describes in one central chapter, four different kinds of survivors, and the strategies they use to escape death. His accounts of his own getting through to the liberation include his appreciations of his friend Albert, and a few other individuals who with no reward to expect for it, helped him on the way.
The bestiality of the Nazis and their helpers is not sermonized about, but rather portrayed in specific incidents of unusual terrible cruelty.
Levi is deeply concerned with the whole question of what it means to be human , and how it is possible to retain human dignity in the most extreme circumstances.
His carefully written record of his own horrifying experience is to this day considered one of the most moving and effective of Holocaust memoirs.

This account of the imprisonment, internment, survival of Primo Levi in Auschwitz is written as a straightforward chronological narrative. Levi recounts his initial capture , the horrendous suffering of the journey of Italian Jews to Auschwitz, the selection there in which all the woman and children were immediately sent to their deaths in the gas- chambers, and in which the able- bodied sent to the work- camp at Buna. Levi tells the story , detail by detail of his getting into the work- order of the Camp. He describes in clear precise language the horrible humiliations the prisoners were subject to. He also describes in one central chapter, four different kinds of survivors, and the strategies they use to escape death. His accounts of his own getting through to the liberation include his appreciations of his friend Albert, and a few other individuals who with no reward to expect for it, helped him on the way.
The bestiality of the Nazis and their helpers is not sermonized about, but rather portrayed in specific incidents of unusual terrible cruelty.
Levi is deeply concerned with the whole question of what it means to be human , and how it is possible to retain human dignity in the most extreme circumstances.
His carefully written record of his own horrifying experience is to this day considered one of the most moving and effective of Holocaust memoirs.

Ever since I first studied the Holocaust in the eighth grade, I love reading and listening to the stories of the people who were in the Holocaust. This is the first Holocaust book that I read. I first read this book when I was in high school. This is one of my favorite Holocaust books.

Ever since I first studied the Holocaust in the eighth grade, I love reading and listening to the stories of the people who were in the Holocaust. This is the first Holocaust book that I read. I first read this book when I was in high school. This is one of my favorite Holocaust books.

It recounts the hellish 12 months that Primo Levi, an Italian jew, spent as Haftling 174517, at the notorious Deathcamp (during 1939 and 1944 2 million people were murdered there). He was captured by the Fascist Militia in December 1943 and wished to be charged based on his religious beliefs rather than his political ones in the view that he would be treated more leniently. After a period in a detention camp at Fossili, Modena, he along with the rest of the Jews are transferred to the concentration camps. The opening chapters describe the horrific conditions of the transfer and the hasty selection process used to determine who would go to the camp and who would go to the gas chambers at Birkenau; all the women, children and infirm were sent to cremation without question. In some ways he was fortunate to have avoided arrest until the latter stages of the war as the Germans decided that the prisoners in the lagers would be of more use to them alive than dead, at Auschwitz they were detailed to build a Buna - a synthetic rubber processing plant which never saw a day of production. Prior to this the prisoners were killed without recourse.

It recounts how far a man can sink and yet survive - every action is a matter of life or death, from conserving energy to get through the next day; to the importance of a good pair of shoes that won't cause sores leading to infection and death; keeping an eye out for any article that can be bartered for a ration of bread; the debilitating effects of the Polish winter when 7 out of 10 prisoners would perish; obtaining a position of some responsibility in the camp (unfortunately usually conferred to a german criminal prisoner); to paring ones emotions until the only thing left is the innate sense of survival and concern for one's own wellbeing; he even describes the characters of different prisoners and how they use every human instinct, guile, cunning, pity etc to remain alive for just one more day.

Out of respect for all those that perished in the camps I believe that this book should be read - if for no other reason that inside of us all there is the possibility that we could become one of the people that design, guard, administer such a camp. If you think you're having a tough time - this book may put things into perspective - you will be different for having read this book.

It's a great book. But if you've already got 'If this is a man', don't buy this.

It's a great book. But if you've already got 'If this is a man', don't buy this.

It's a great book. But if you've already got 'If this is a man', don't buy this.

I stopped reading books of the Holocaust several years ago simply because the stories that come out of the Holocaust are heart-wrenching, bitter, courgaeous, guilt-ridden .... all of the emotions and thoughts that we human have produced can be a lot to digest at one time.

I was at my parents' house when I saw this book lying on the coffee table. It was a book lent to my dad by his secretary's daughter, who just finished a course on the Holocaust and this was one of the required readings. I picked it up and from the preface, I was hooked by the author's precise and thoughtful wording. It is not an emotional book ~~ it is a book about survival. It is an observation of the "Lager," where Levi was held in. It was a clinical look as well ~~ it was his way of surviving and denying his humanness. It is definitely not an emotional rehashing of his time in the concentration camps, especially at Auschwitz, which is the worst of them all. I also get the feeling that he sometimes has an air of disbelief around him, like it's not really happening ~~ it's a nightmare that he never could wake up from.

I would rate it a Five Star but I don't love this book. I thoroughly appreciate the discourse Levi has shared with us. It is a look from a survior who didn't color it with his emotions ~~ yes, it happened and this is what happened. It wasn't till the very end of this book where he described the ten days in the infirmary after the 20,000 "healthy" prisoners were marched into oblivion with the Germans, that he showed any emotion. It was then he allowed himself to be a man again, instead of a "Halfinge" ~~ a slave. He never put his survival to fate or to a higher being. He put it to luck. He was lucky to be sick at the right time. And he was.

5-28-06

There are reasons why it is difficult to review a book like this. First, it is a translation so it is hard to tell whether problems with prose belong to the author or the translator. Second, it is a Holocaust memoir which means criticizing it feels like criticizing the author's experiences. And yet, if we are going to do justice to any piece of writing, a reader has to be willing to be honest about his reactions to it. My reaction is simple: I think this is a good piece of writing but not a great one.

Despite it's brevity, I found this a very difficult book to get through. I wanted very much to be moved by Levi's experiences but it wasn't until the final section, "The Story of Ten Days," that I really felt emotion--that I connected to the author's fight for survival. Most of the time I felt detached because the writing felt very clinical to me. Unlike Elie Weisel's Night, for example, a memoir I've read many times, which grabs me from the first page and doesn't let go.

This is not to discount the horror of Auschwitz's nor Levi's obvious suffering. I guess it's just that, strange as it may sound, I want to be drawn into the author's horror and share his plight. I rarely had that feeling here. However, there is no doubt that this book offers a unique insight into the Auschwitz experience and cannot be discounted. Anyone interested in trying to understand the insanity that was the Holocaust needs to read it.

Usually in deep dark corners of the world that rarely get exposed can you get a good look at the depths of humanity. This book is one of those experiences. That must be why I am so fascinated by WWII, especially the Holocaust and the Eastern Front. I am always on the look-out for stories like this; as a student of WWII and psychology, I highly enjoyed and cherish this book.

This book is a shocking, riviting account of one man's survival in Auschwitz. The mere fact that he managed to survive in the most inhumane circumstances and the author's ability to convey in great clarity the horrific circumstances that he survived, is a miracle in itself. This brings to mind the atrocities of that time and reminds us to never let it happen again. This book is inspiring.

. . . is about the ten months Levi was forced to live in the concentration camp. This is a well-written book which expresses feelings of excitement, sarcasm, fear, and relief. This book was incredibly enjoyable to read. Levi's style is both original and powerful, and he portrays his point in an effective manner. Levi told his story using mainly his own experiences, intertwined with some history on the Holocaust. This was a convincing story of the life in Auschwitz.Thanks..........DD

Primo Levi's memoir, Survival in Auschwitz, is a moving account of one young man's struggle for survival in the notorious Polish concentration camp. Levi employs a unique narrative structure, emphasizing the power of words both thematically and stylistically. Levi is only twenty-five when he enters the camp, and his storytelling does much to reveal the devastating impact that concentration camps had on the psyche and on the spirit. Levi confronts the harsh reality of what life in Auschwitz means, and how different it is from any form of civilization. "Here the struggle to survive is without respite," he writes, "because everyone is desperately and ferociously alone" (88). One of the evil images that haunts Levi will haunt readers as well: "an emaciated man, with head dropped and shoulders curved, on whose face and in whose eyes not a trace of a thought is to be seen" (90).

In clear contrast to the camp's dehumanizing effects on its victims, Levi uses language to stir the hearts of his readers. In a kind of dictionary of suffering, he gives the reader the terms of his old existence: Buna, where young men labor in a factory that will never produce synthetic rubber; Ka-Be, the infirmary where Levi is granted a few weeks' rest to recover from a foot injury, and Selekcja, the Polish word for "selection," that seals the fate of those marked for the crematorium. Because the camp contains Jews and other prisoners from all parts of Europe, facility with multiple languages represents a survival tool as well as a mark of education. Levi tells the success story of young man, Henri, who is able to cultivate many contacts because he speaks four languages. In one of the book's most heart-stirring passages, Levi attempts to translate Dante's canto of Ulysses into French in an effort to increase a friend's understanding of his heritage and the remnants of his humanity (112).

As Levi notes in the foreword, his narrative is not strictly chronological-the main events are in 1944, but Levi does not give dates to events until the last few days in camp, after the Germans have evacuated. In one chapter, Levi has to ask himself, "How many months have gone by since we entered the camp?" Eventually he asks the more sobering question, "how many of us will be alive at the new year?" (136).

That Levi can begin to keep track of time after the camp's liquidation signifies his return to a life where the future is more than another day of deprivation and suffering. At one point, Levi notes that the camp term for "never," is morgen früh, German for tomorrow morning (133). Though Levi's book is powerful for the factual events it recounts, the questions it raises leave the most lasting impact. Survival in Auschwitz asks what makes a human, what it takes to destroy that humanity, and humanity is recovered. Many readers wishing to learn more about the Holocaust or concentration camps will find Levi's work powerful and enriching. Perhaps more importantly, these readers will continue to ask Levi's questions in today's society.
Thanks-JM

Primo Levi's description of his internment at auschwitz was very interesting for certain. He doesn't paint the picture of his time at Auschwitz with broad strokes, but rather is very specific so that you understand the day to day life of the people there.

The chapters I found most intrigueing were the descriptions in the first few chapters about the journey to the camp, and then the chapter entitled "10 days" about their freedom regained.

This is a book for someone who wants to get down to the specifics of the trajedy that was the holocost

i had to read this book for a class but it was very descriptive and very well-written. emotional, heartfelt, etc.

I've read plenty of books on Auschwitz and the concentration camp system. Most of them are great at explaining the machinations of the camp system and various experiences from a distance. In this book, Primo Levi puts you right in the center of Hell. Thanks to his amazing eye for detail and his wonderful eloquence you will get an understanding of the horrors of day-to-day life in Auschwitz that few books can provide. I devoured this book and immediately followed it with its sequel The Reawakening, and then The Drowned & The Saved.

I chose this book, Survival in Auschwitz, as part of my European Civilization class which I took at Georgetown University.
Survival in Auschwitz, by Primo Levi, and originally published in 1958 as "If this is a Man" is the author's account of his ten month imprisonment at a Nazi death camp. Levi begins his story in Italy, when, as a 25 year old, he is captured by the Italian fascists for being a Jew. He then begins to tell of his trip to Auschwitz, on a train, which lasted for four days, and which contained 650 people who were without access to food or water. Once at Auschwitz, and only after surviving the first "selection," Levi begins to work at the nearby kommandos, providing goods for the German war effort.
Levi's story of working at the factories is told in a chronological manner and uses an almost unemotional tone which seems to hide the impact of the atrocities which were taking place. While working, Levi tells the reader of the mass hunger the inmates were experiencing and how their meal intake had been reduced to a few pieces of bread and several bowls of soup a day.
Eventually, Levi is promoted to the Chemical Kommando (the German term for factory) where he serves out the rest of his days at Auschwitz working with hazardous materials.
Survival in Auschwitz, as Levi tells it, is a story of how the Nazi's tried to dehumanize and destroy the non-Aryan race.

Primo Levi's first-hand account of life at Auschwitz is perhaps is perhaps the most detailed and wonderful account of life at a Nazi death camp that I have ever read. Levi uses simple and detailed yet elegant language to show how the Nazi's tried to destroy their inmates. He paints of wonderful picture of how life at Auschwitz is similar to slavery, where people are forced to work and where people have no control over their own lives. Organizing the book chronologically helps to build to the emotional aspect of this book. In the end this book clearly shows what humans can do when hate becomes a major part of life.
Though I claim to have picked this novel for my European Civilization class, I probably also picked Survival in Auschwitz because I am Jewish myself and because I had family who were imprisoned in concentration camps around Europe. This story is the best retelling of life on a concentration camp that I have yet to read. I thoroughly enjoyed Levi's novel.

This is the first book about the holocaust I have read that doesn't focus on the evil performed by the Germans, although that was done, but talks about the emotional and psychic changes that the inmates were forced to adopt due to the circumstances they were in. Because of this, in many ways the story is more frightening and horrifying. The need to survive was so great that much of normal human interaction was lost, and with it caring for your fellow man.

Last semester I read this book for a class I was taking on the History of Nazi Germany. In this book I found Primo Levi's account of the holocaust did an excellent job of giving the reader a sense of the horror that was faced by all of the people that were in the concentration camps during WWII. It also was well written and though not an uplifting read would be good for anyone who would like to gain a better understanding of the events that took place during this time in history.

What makes Primo Levi's account of life in Monowitz so amazing is the immediacy of it all: he speaks in the present tense, as if all this is happening again, now. For Levi, it's not in the past, was never in the past.

That, and the little things that we take for granted. Here, the water is not drinkable. And the fit of one's clogs can be a matter of life or death. One must not talk.

One finds oneself in the blue and icy snow of dawn, barefoot and naked, with all one's clothing in hand and one hundred yards to go to the next hut, where one may finally get dressed.

Another thing Levi understands: it can always be worse, and that for most everyone, it does get worse. When readers finish this book, they understand an iota of what Levi suffered, what all the vanquished innocents suffered.

--Alyssa A. Lappen

This book is a pregnant reminiscence of life in a German concentration camp during World War II: naked struggle for survival, hunger, brutal egoism, breaking of mental resistance by forcing the execution of senseless repetitive tasks (cleansing), treating of the inmates as a herd of cattle or as pure numbers, public executions.

Primo Levi analyzes the different more or less successful strategies of survival: organizing (stealing, smuggling, barter) or long time planning for a privileged position.

The living conditions were terrible: bitter coldness, physically (climate) as well as mentally (one was ruthlessly left to only one's own devices).
Also the Matthew effect played in full: 'who haves, shall be given; who doesn't have, shall be taken'.
Yet, notwithstanding these soul-destroying circumstances the author didn't loose his faith in humanity, because of a few unselfish deeds by some inmates.

Primo Levi wrote this profound human document as a sinister warning, for those inhuman racist treatments could happen again.

Not to be missed.

I also recommend the works of Jorge Semprun and Imre Kertesz about the same themes.

Primo Levi's recollections of "life" in Auschwitz is a truly horrifying and enlightening account. Life must be in quotation marks, because even though Levi survived the horrors of the concentration camp, his time there was certainly not living - only dying. Levi begins his introduction by warning the reader that these memories may not flow in order but are recorded the way he remembers them irregardless of continuity.

An Italian Jew, Levi was an outlaw when captured in his mid-twenties and deported to Auschwitz. His recall for the tiniest details is amazing, but he credits the fact that he was always thinking as his main means of survival. He describes in vivid detail what it was like to be in the railroad cars transporting them to the camp, the selection process and what one acclimated to life inside the barbed wire fences. As a higher number, Levi is inexperienced and must learn how to endure being treated worse than animals by the Germans and his superiors. He vivdly describes his trials in working and living, fighting over and for every little thing that could help him survive.

Levi concludes his autobiographical account with a chapter that reads like a diary entry, reviewing his last ten days in the camp after the Germans had fled, before the camp was liberated by foreign armies. Perhaps at times it seems that Levi is detached and lacks emotion in his writing - he doesn't allow himself to think too long about these people he misses, who were brutually snatched away from him forever. Rather, he is straightforward in recording the facts as he remembers them, as horrifying and unbelievable as some of them are.

The afterword, in this edition, by Philip Roth allows the reader a chance to "interact" with Primo Levi. Roth asks him about his experiences and the influences behind his writings, which are mainly all autobiographical. Levi acknowledges that he is truly lucky - his family survived the Holocaust when others didn't. He hasn't forgotten his trials and experiences. They have shaped his entire life and ways of thinking.