Editor's View About Televised Melodramatic Holocaust' Series By PHILIP SLOMOVITZ Pre-judging a play, any show, in its entirety, based on impressions left after se- eing only a portion of it, can be damaging to stage criti- cism (in any form). The four-night "Holocaust" TV drama may have fallen into this category. The first por- tion, the initial three hours, were given extensive pub- licity in previews. Then came the follow-ups. The entire nine-and-a-half hours (that was the time element, including com- mercials) should have been seen and judged by histo- rians. Perhaps there might have been a different ap- proach by the many, many national organizations who are listed as sponsors and by the cooperative com- munities like ours. Now the facts must be judged realistically. Historical novels have a place in fiction. Fiction has no place in history. When a great human tragedy is transformed into melod- rama, history can be dis- torted. "Holocaust" as seen in the NBC performances may not have been distorted but it certainly was not re- corded properly. There was breast- Daey—Holpi•el . $: SrePalbY FRUIT BASKET'S.; 3 Times Daily:: Nation-Wide:: Delivery $ 1595 ROUNICK- MeINERNErS 7794140 772-4350 Right In Your own Driveway! 111 Crolled by the Nelms! Auromollv• InsNur• GI Emir.= corms b year home or cad WO Vt. Vong•-a2-1.1bets. - Valet sink* Mot dosenT cost one penny ebb • Export O•pre•lle rare-up • emersole earyzer - ar NNW sysesme • Praiser ramilly Iraird machrdca • Poled mulls assarad Expended Undue, Call Sanford Roeenbalg for your ear problems 398-3605 8-cv4. cars 831.50 inducks EVERYTHING: Later AND Parts. 4 and 8 cy. cornmeal...1y 1,7• aftsarcharg• and ElaricAmerIcard beating: teaching the Holocaust should be a vital part of the educational sys- tem, all educational sys-: terns. That was and remains the plea. Was the proper end achieved with the NBC- created "Holocaust?" Would an honest historian take the melodrama produced on television and transform it into a textbook? Is this the way to teach history? American Jewry is not devoid of historians and dedicated pedagogs. Would they offer the melodrama as it was tele- vised as textbook for young and old, and espe- cially for children? NBC's dramatization is so deeply moving, the expose of the horrors is often so ef- fective, that even with the shortcomings of melod- ramatization there is a debt to be recognized in what had been achieved. The work of exposing the Holocaust crimes must go on. Yet, there were recogniz- able shorttomings. The very dramatization of the single Nazi, Erik Dorf, as symptomatic of all- the Nazi leaders retained the stamp of fiction on the great show without giving the searcher for facts and truth an opportunity to learn what was acting and what had really occurred. This character Dorf is everywhere. Wherever you turn he shows up. True, there is occasional mention of Hitler, Goering, Goeb- bela, Heydrich, Himmler, but unless history is known they are invisible and hid- den from the actual story. In a sense the Dorf emphasis is a farce. Can it be said that Babi Yar was truthfully depicted in the drama? Is the under- ground and the resistance effectively shown? Will the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising be fully appreciated as one of the great acts of heroism on the basis of the fictionalized history on TV? Your editor isn't really concerned with the anti- Israel, anti-Zionist critics who are quoted charging that the NBC show is Zionist propaganda to build up sentiment for Is- rael. Who are these critics to tell Israel, the Jew, the Israeli about his right to live, to function in a human society, to be mas- ter of his own destiny? We are back where we started. The Holocaust has been ignored, it needs to be taught, and the factual textbooks will have to be re-opened and dusted off. The historian must assume his place in recording and interpreting history, the pedagog must come to his aid and the responsible community must keep encouraging every effort at exposing the crimes which, despite their bestialities, still have their endorsers in the ranks of the so-called neo-Nazis. The best way to teach the Holocaust is by documen- tary history. If nine-and-a- half hours is not sufficient, let it be 90 hours. But let history be written and re- corded and retold by histo- rians. Let it be said again: the Holocaust was a human tragedy. The savagery by the Germans was against (Continued on Page 0) THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS Friday, April 21, 1918 5 QUARTZ ACCURACY George Ohrenstein Jewelers Ltd. Creative Jewelers Diamonds Precious Stones Precision Time Pieces HARVARD ROW MALL 11 Mlle & Lahser 353-3146 Best Passover Wishes FROM ALL OF US AT shifinatih LINCOLN CENTER Greenfield @ 101/2 Mile from OMEGA This is what watches are coming to. Guaranteed to within 5 seconds a month, the Omega "Sea Master" Quartz watch features an accurate second hand and calendar func- tion. Model featured: gold filled stainless steel $325.00 $275.00