Warsaw Ghetto and The Pianist - Research Paper Example

531600 The Warsaw Ghetto and The Pianist Wladyslaw Szpilman was a Polish Jewish man who lived through the Jewish Holocaust. He was a musician and his experiences were shown in the movie and the book, The Pianist. The book was written by Szpilman and his son was able to get it published because he wanted people to know what happened to his father. The Holocaust was a very bad situation that happened to the Jews and reading a personal account was very difficult at times. The Warsaw Ghetto was where most of Szpilmans experiences happened. The Warsaw Ghetto was not a happy place or one where people were treated well. 1. The Background of the Warsaw Ghetto In 1939, the German Nazis took over the control of the countries of Poland and Warsaw and all the Jews were forced to wear a "Star of David" to identify that they were Jews. After awhile, the Jewish people were treated like slaves because they could not go anywhere or do anything unless they had permission from the Nazis. In 1940, the Warsaw Ghetto was created in a small town outside of Warsaw. There were 113,000 Poles that were made to leave their homes so the area could be made to keep 400,000 Jews (U.S. Holocaust Museum). The people living in the Ghetto were kept in by a wall that was put up and barbed wire that was put on top of it to keep people from getting out. At first everything looked normal to the Jewish people but life in the Ghetto became very hard and the people were treated badly. People starved in the Ghetto because they were poor and because they were not given very much food to eat. More Jews were brought into the Ghetto and everyone was cramped up in their places they lived and people started to die from starving and from typhoid. 2. Szpilmans Experiences The history of what has already been discussed is exactly what Szpilman states as his experience. He was a musician and he played the piano before all of this happened. He worked for Warsaw Radio before the Nazis came. Szpilmans story starts in the beginning part of the Ghetto when cafes were open and the rich people acted like nothing bad was happening. Meanwhile, many Jews were starving already and they had to steal food whenever they could to get enough to eat (Szpilman 14). He talked about the typhus breakout and says that 5,000 people died every month from this disease (Szpilman 17). The story that Szpilman gives is accurate to the historical accounts that were found when I researched the book. The Jews did not seem to expect that the Ghetto would be formed after the war started because the Germans came into their town without warning and they were not threatening them at first. People were leaving their town because they were afraid, but when the Germans came they told everyone not to worry and told them to just stay (Szpilman 33). The people though they were safe and that the Germans came to help them. There was a general in each city and the Jews were told to dig trenches around their city so that German tanks could not get to them (Szpilman 34). The city was being bombed at every turn and everyday people were being killed by the bombs. Many people lost their homes because of what happened and the whole city was being destroyed. The people in his village also had to walk past their friends who were dead and left in the street. Szpilman talked about how bad the bodies smelled as they walked by because the bodies were rotting in the street (Szpilman 42). The Jews who were still alive felt very happy because they were still alive and they thought they were safe from danger because the bombing had stopped for awhile. Szpilman describes the first problems with the Germans as nothing very bad. He saws when a Jew was seen on the street by the Germans they were taken away in a car to some place, and then kicked or slapped while the Germans asked them questions. They did not see this situation as very bad because people always came back to their families. There were many laws that they called decrees that the Germans put in the village that were specific to tell Jews what to do. These decrees were rules that the Germans made up to make the Jews do things. As an example, Jews had to give all their real estate to the Germans and they could only keep a certain amount of money in their house. The rest of their money had to go into the bank (Szpilman 45). Most Jews began to hide anything that was valuable in a place where they hoped the Germans could not find it. These were the early years of the German occupation of Jewish towns and many Jews chose to leave. Those that chose to leave went to Russia. They lost their belongings and money because the Germans took it away from them. One of the reasons why the Jews were hurt in this village in my opinion was that they did not see that all the small things that happened were leading up to bad things happening. They tried to live their lives as they always had lived them instead of leaving before things got really bad. The Germans also made the Jews do curfews. This meant that they had to be inside their houses by a certain time every night or they would get into trouble with the Germans. Some people were shot if they were caught outside after curfew. The Germans continued to create problems for the Jews and slowly made decrees that would move some people into concentration camps. Also, there were a lot of comments that Jewish people were bad people and they were called "parasites" and the Germans said they spread disease (Szpilman 58). 1.1 Life in the Warsaw Ghetto The Ghetto was blocked off by walls and a gate was locked to stop Jews from leaving. Some Jews already lived in the Ghetto areas but those who did not had to pay a lot of money and find a new place to live inside the Ghetto walls. Szpilman said that a half a million people had to find a place to live in this very small area (59). The Germans started making the area of the Ghetto smaller and smaller. The Ghetto was later made into two parts -- a small part and a large part and these two parts were separated by certain streets. The smaller Ghetto smelled bad and there were vermin in the streets. The Jews in the Ghettos were made to wait to cross the street sometimes or they were made to dance in the streets so the Germans could laugh at them (Szpilman 66). People had to trade things to get food and they were not allowed to have anything of value. The Ghetto was also very dirty and it smelled of decay and the Jews lived in fear of dying everyday. They could also be beaten by the German police or shot at any time (Szpilman 69). In the Ghetto there was also an area called the Umschlaplatz which was an area where people who were killed for whatever they did wrong were put. Szpilman gives descriptions of what Germans did to kill people. As an example, they would take children by their feet and throw them head first against a wall (Szpilman 99). This was a very horrible thing to read that they did. The Umschlagplatz was also used as a place to bring new people into the Ghetto or to make them wait to get on a cattle car that took them to a train that took them to a concentration camp. Szpilman lost his entire family one day when they were made to go to the Umschlaplatz and put into the cattle cars. After his family was taken away, Szpilman played piano for awhile in the Aryan part of the Ghetto at one of the faces. He had to work at breaking down one of the walls later and he had to find ways to buy food because he was not paid for his jobs. At first he could buy food in the markets and take the food back to the Ghetto and get more money than what he paid for it. Soon, the Germans stopped the Jews from being able to buy food in the market. The German SS men began to kill many Jews in the Ghetto. Szpilman tells of a situation where several people were ordered to go to the left or to the right on the street. Those who went to the left had to lay face down on the ground and the SS men shot each person in the head (Szpilman 114). They did not have any sadness for killing these people. Next, some people were given numbers and told that they would stay in the Ghetto while the others had to move out to the concentration camps. Szpilman was always lucky because he was never killed. The people living in the Ghetto had to work and most were only given watery soup to eat before they went to work. Some Jews were building the SS commandants palace and they were given soup with meat in it (Szpilman 116). The numbers of people in the Ghetto had changed from 400,000 to only 60,000 by 1942 (Szpilman 121). This meant that many people had been killed in the Ghetto or sent to the concentration camps to be killed. The saddest part of the book was that no matter what the Germans continued to kill people. In 1943, some of the Jews got guns and ammunition and fought against the Germans. Many Jews were killed but many escaped to Russia. Many Jews felt it was better to die trying to defend themselves than to wait for the Germans to kill them. Szpilman was able to get out of the Ghetto and move in with friends for awhile where he could play piano again. He went back to play for the Polish radio station for a little while. He stayed in an artists studio that was more comfortable than living in the Ghetto. He had to be very quiet during the day. This was short lived though because the Germans found out that a Jew was hiding somewhere in the building and the family that was helping him had to leave because they were afraid they would be killed. Once the family left, Szpilmans food ran out. He was supposed to be helped by another person who the first family said would take care of him. This persons name was Szalas but he did not take very good care of Szpilman. He would only bring a little bit of food for him from time to time. Szpilman was eventually betrayed by Szalas and had to find another hiding place. He was also very sick because of a liver and gall bladder problem but there were no doctors around to help him. Part of the problem for him was that he was not able to find food so his body was starving. After many days of not eating Szpilman was found by a German officer in a building with an out of tune piano. The German officer made him play something on the piano. The German officer would bring him food when he could and Szpilman would play for him. The Polish military eventually took over Poland and Szpilman was taken from his hiding place once they knew that he was also Polish. He was taken care of by the Polish people and he was able to get good finally. He was also to walk through the Warsaw Ghetto and found that it had been destroyed by the Germans. There was nothing left. He had memories of his family but he would never see them again (186). Szpilman went back to playing piano for the Polish radio. Another important part of the book was the part of a diary of Wilm Hosenfeld who was the German that helped Szpilman. Szpilman told him that if he ever needed him, he would just have to ask for him. The problem was that Szpilman never knew the Germans name so when the German needed up in the prisoner of war camp, he could not notify Szpilman. The German officer died in the prisoner of war camp. The diary of Hosenfeld was interesting because he had been a teacher before the war. He saw that what the Germans were doing was wrong and he hated being a part of it. He helped Jews when he could and it seemed that he understood what was happening and tried to help. After I read the book, I also looked at the movie. I wanted to see how it was on the screen. The movie was very much like the book. I was sad about the Jews and how they were treated. I did not understand how people could treat other people like that. To see it on the screen was even more terrible because the Germans looked like they did not care about killing people. They were doing it all as fun. They were laughing at what they were doing and they did not seem to be very nice about anything they did with the Jews. The book was very interesting and it was something that I think that I would never want to happen to me. I think that this was a time when people were very mean and the Jews were victims because they really could not fight back. I was always hoping when reading the book that they would do something to save themselves but I think that they were just not that type of people. They always saw the good things no matter what happened to them. I do not know if I could be in a situation like that and have the same feeling that they did. An interesting thing at the end of the book was when there was an interview with Szpilman and he was asked if he resented or hated the Germans for what they did. He said that he did not. It was something that happened and he just had to put it behind him. I think that was a very good attitude, but at the same time, I think it would be hard not to be angry at people who had treated you so bad. I think that this was an interesting time in history and it made me want to read some more about the Holocaust but it is also very difficult to read it at the same time. I think that the movie was very hard to watch and I was in tears many times watching what people did. I hope this never happens again to anyone. Works Cited Szpilman, Wladslaw. The Pianist. NY: Picador, 1999. United States Holocaust Museum. " Szpilmans Warsaw" The History Behind The Pianist" . http://www.ushmm.org/museum/exhibit/focus/pianist 12 May 2011. Read More