Me Why

The Whole Truth

Why Schindler's List is a work of "fiction."

ELIZABETH APPLEBAUM ASSOCIATE EDITOR

PHOTO BY GLEN N TRI ES T

Q: I'm deeply per-
plexed. Processing new
material into the com-
munity library, I came
across the library's cards
for the cassette record-
ing of Schindler's List.
I was shocked to see
"fiction" after Oskar
Schindler's name and af-
ter "Holocaust, Jewish."
Do you know what the
reasoning regarding this
could be?

PHOTO © GLEN CALVIN MOON

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WERE FIGHTING FOR YOUR LIFE

Tom Keneally: Tell him no lies.

Q: I recently heard that a fa-
mous Russian author wrote a let-
ter condemning officials of the
czar, and it had something to do
with the Jews. Is that true? What's
the story?
A: In fact, two Russian au-
thors — Leo Tolstoy and Max-
im Gorky — spoke out on
behalf of the Jews at the turn
of the century. Gorky wrote a
book about the 1903 Kishinev
pogrom, while Leo Tolstoy
penned a letter castigating
czarist authorities for their role
in the terror.
Kishinev was the seat of two
notorious pogroms. The first
occurred at Easter 1903 after
leading Russian officials
charged Jews in the death of a
Christian child (later, it was
discovered the boy had been
killed by family members). A
mob was formed and began a
rampage, murdering 49 Jews,
wounding another 500 and
leaving 2,000 families without
homes.
Like L6t, Tolstoy, U.S. Pres-
ident Theodore Roosevelt
wrote a letter condemning the
authorities' actions (some
5,000 of the czar's soldiers were
in the city at the time and did
nothing to stop the mob). The
czar refused to accept it.
The second pogrom occurred
in 1905, when 19 Jews were
killed and 56 hurt.
Forever affected by these at-
tacks, the Jews of Kishinev be-
gan leaving town. Some 7,000
emigrated between 1902 and
1905.

From A.S. in Suttons
Bay, Mi.
A: Schindler's List
is, without a doubt, a
true story. How the
movie (and thus the
cassette) came to be la-
beled a work of fiction
is simply a matter of
the author's determi-
nation not to take lit-
erary license with any
(however minor) details.
Thomas Keneally based
much of his book Schindler's
List on interviews with 50 of
the men and women Schindler
saved. He also drew on Yad
Vashem testimony from Holo-
caust survivors and on reports
from Schindler's colleagues and
friends.
In the introduction to his
books Mr. Keneally writes
that he has done his best "to
avoid all fiction, since fiction
would debase the record." Yet
because he uses the "texture
and devices of a novel to tell a
true story," he could not, in
good conscience, call it pure
fact. -
An example of this is recon-
structing a conversation. Un-
less the writer was standing
there, tape recorder in hand, <
he can never report exactly
what was said. What he can do
is speak with those who were
there and, to the best of his
ability, recreate what took
place.
For many authors (and cer-
tain filmmakers), it matters lit-
tle whether someone said,
"Next week I'll go to the store
and buy 10 books and one new
shirt," or "In the near future I'll
be buying some things." The
notion that they have the basic
'idea of what happened is
enough for them to label their
work a true story.
Clearly, Mr. Keneally is not
that kind of person.

r-/