Perl & Krug

[Leslie Skantz-Hodgson]

While Perl was visiting a country/people she was taught to hate, Krug was interrogating her homeland – her heimat. As a Jew – someone who would have been victimized if she’d been in Austria during Hitler’s rule – Perl wanted to know how such horrors could have been inflicted; how people who had to have known what was going on nonetheless turned a blind eye. As a German, Krug wanted to know if her grandparents were complicit in Nazi atrocities, and if so, to what degree. She was afraid of what she might learn – the possibility that they were indeed Nazi sympathizers – but she felt she needed to know either way.
Both Perl and Krug encountered people across the spectrum of willingness to acknowledge and discuss the awful period in history, and in having those difficult discussions they received a far more nuanced look not only at the Holocaust, but also at themselves. They learned that everyone’s personal history (including their own) was fraught. They had the narratives their parents told them, and then they had the stories of the people they interviewed (Krug) and taught (Perl). They listened. They considered. They reconsidered. They showed – and at times experienced – grace.

[Barbara Lazar]

Leslie,
oooooh…I love your last line and want to always exhibit this: “They listened. They considered. They reconsidered. They showed – and at times experienced – grace.”
And as in ‘Hamilton’ “Talk less. Smile more. Listen more.”

[Author]

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