Elisabeth Sommer-Lefkovits was born in 1904 in Austro-Hungary. She practised pharmacy in Presov until she was deported to Ravensbruck and Bergen-Belsen. She wrote her memoir more than forty years after these times, and died in Switzerland in 1994.
Elaine Feinstein says in her Introduction: 'This is in many ways a unique memoir. It is the only first-hand account I know of a mother's efforts to preserve the life of her child in the full horror of the camps... The story is told in clean spare language, without the least attempt to mitigate or exaggerate... No one who reads it will fail to be moved.'
The daughter of refugees herself, Marjorie Harris studied German at Manchester University. While working at the Royal Society, she was asked to translate the book into English by a friend of Elisabeth's surviving son, now an eminent scientist.
Elaine Feinstein says in her Introduction: 'This is in many ways a unique memoir. It is the only first-hand account I know of a mother's efforts to preserve the life of her child in the full horror of the camps... The story is told in clean spare language, without the least attempt to mitigate or exaggerate... No one who reads it will fail to be moved.'
The daughter of refugees herself, Marjorie Harris studied German at Manchester University. While working at the Royal Society, she was asked to translate the book into English by a friend of Elisabeth's surviving son, now an eminent scientist.