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May 06, 1994 - Image 18

Resource type:
Text
Publication:
The Detroit Jewish News, 1994-05-06

Disclaimer: Computer generated plain text may have errors. Read more about this.

STREET WISE

with STYLE

NOW, you can purchase the latest issue of
STYLE from these convenient locations:

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Keneally's Speech
Attracts 2,200

RUTH LITTMANN STAFF WRITER

M

oris Huppert didn't see
the Academy Award-
winning movie,
Schindler's List. He
didn't have to.
He was there.
The 70-year-old survivor calls
himself a "Schindler Jew," one of
more than 1,200 individuals Os-
kar Schindler, a German indus-
trialist, saved from Nazi
extermination during World War
II.
Mr. Huppert lives in West
Bloomfield. Some 50 years later,
the horror of the Holocaust still
plagues him.
"It's every night. Sometimes I
scream and my wife wakes me
up. The memories will never go
away," he said.
On Monday, Mr. Huppert was
among 2,200 Detroiters attend-
ing a Jewish Federation-spon-
sored speech by Schindler's List
author Thomas Keneally. The
crowd filled the sanctuary at
Adat Shalom Synagogue and
spilled over into the social hall,
where the audience watched Mr.
Keneally on closed-circuit televi-
sion.
"The series of accidents that
led to the writing of the book and
then the film are remarkable
enough to still astound me. I can't
get enough of speaking about
them," Mr. Keneally said. "It's
like talking about when you've
met someone you love."
In 1980, the native Australian
stopped at a luggage store in Bev-
erly Hills, Calif., where he met
owner Leopold Pfefferberg, a
Schindler Jew. Intrigued by the
survivor's description of the hero-
ic, yet checkered, Oskar
Schindler, Mr. Keneally em-
barked upon the novel, which

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PUBLISHED BY THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS

Thomas Keneally

won the Booker Prize for Fiction watch it?
"Mind you, I don't think those
in 1983.
"I'm a questionable Catholic in __figures are necessarily an index
a different way from Oskar. Os- of anti-Semitism. Those same 22
kar was a sensualist. I have percent don't know where Cana-
doubts, you see, which is a bit dif- da is, either."
The movie was released this
ferent from being a sensualist.
year in a limited number of cin-
It's not as much fun.
"He was a man out of control, emas. It won an Oscar this
but thank God he was out of con- spring.
Often, authors deplore the film
trol in the right way ... I was at-
tracted by the fact that virtue adaptation of their books. Mr.
would emerge in this unlikely Keneally, however, was delight-
man," he said. "I always like it ed with the screenwriter's treat-
when virtue arises in people the ment of Schindler's List. There
were elements of the story that
bishops say it shouldn't have.
"On top of that, I realize that each medium highlighted.
The book explored Mr.
Oskar's story gave you a lens, a
focus, through which you could Schindler's involvement in Ger-
man intelligence as well as his
look at that whole giant phe-
black-market activities which
nomenon of the Holocaust.
"I've realize now, too, that I earned him most of the millions
never understood classic anti- he used to bribe Nazi officials
and save Jewish lives.
Semitism."
Mr. Keneally said he learned
a lot through writing the book,
and still more in 1982, when he
started working with director
Steven Spielberg to produce the
film. The mission of both men
— Thomas Keneally
was to create a movie to educate
the world about the Holocaust.
The movie, on the other hand.,
But Schindler's List almost
accentuated the symbiotic rela-
didn't happen.
"The film wasn't immediately tionship of Mr. Schindler and the
made. Steven couldn't get the Jews who worked for him.
"I believe there was a rough
screenplay he wanted and he was
afraid of the reaction of the crit- sort of covenant operating be-
ics. He was worried about how to tween Oskar and these workers,"
make it in a manner that he said. "The covenant was:
wouldn't trivialize it. He left it in keep you more or less safe here
limbo for a long time," Mr. Ke- and you work for me. If ever you
get into the furnace, I'll try to
neally said.
"Even when the film was pluck you out."
Mr. Keneally has published
made, Spielberg wondered who
would watch it in America. The more than 25 books during his
22 percent of the young who career. His most recent works in-
think that the Holocaust might clude the novels Playmaker, , As-
not have happened? Would they mara and Flying Hero Class. The
author said he is glad Schindler's
List hit the big screen this year.
`Phis was the best of times be-
cause the deniers are at their
strongest. The aged, who had
gone through the Holocaust, are
looking at going into the dark-
ness. This is the period, of course,
when the young wonder if Hitler
was real. If it all really happened.
"I wrote the book, not just for
Jews, but also for gentiles be-
cause it is the most extreme les-
son we have, and if repressed it
will most certainly recur.
"Steven's film has made the
Holocaust altogether less deni-
able and that is a great service,"
he said. "If I've also had a part in
making the Holocaust less deni-
able — though, in the start, I was
a dumb goy looking for a brief-
case — then I'm very grate-
fti l.

"Oskar was a
sensualist."

))

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