An important and eloquent article - thank you. Once these stories take root it’s very difficult to weed them out and they can alter the historical narrative over time. We owe it to those who lost their lives to ensure the truth is kept alive.
And you say you aren't a 'historian'! You do more to correct duff history than many and that is SO important. Gaining as true an evidenced narrative is essential - especially when others try to hijack a popular historiography for their own ends, bravo!
Obviously I agree that there is no place for inaccuracy in anything relating to the Holocaust, which is why I have a huge amount of respect for those who put all the hard work into finding out the truth, or otherwise, behind some of these narratives.
A question, though, if I may - why do people like Avery do it? Do you think he was simply and cynically trying to reap the rewards of something he knew perfectly well never happened? Or did he 'improve' on something real until the real story came to be encased in a thick carapace of self-aggrandising fiction? Or was there some actual trauma which he managed to cover up by creating a narrative in which he was more in control, more the hero and benefactor, than he managed to be in real life? In short, did he come to believe any of this stuff?
'Old men forget, and all shall be forgot - but we'll remember with advantages what deeds we did that day' ...
Few narratives of any sort are indisputable; plenty involve wishful thinking, selective memory, literary 'improvement' and revision; when the subject is the Holocaust, though, the stakes are perhaps uniquely high. I very much agree with you that publishers these days have a real obligation to run any Holocaust narrative past someone - ideally, several people - with deep scholarly knowledge of the sources, existing narratives and, yes, existing fakes. And there is literally no excuse at all for Hodders to keep the wretched Avery book on sale.
Very much agree. There are a number of notorious ‘tellers of tall tales’ Christopher Lee for example. But there is something particularly noxious about those who chose to present fictional memoirs of the Holocaust. What responsibility do publishers have to undertake due diligence and not take these at face value, they do as much harm to our understanding of the Holocaust as certain pyjama based ‘children’s’ books.
This fakery boils my ****. Auschwitz Memorial are fantastic at setting the score strait especially on Twitter.
Until your “Hunting Evil” I looked on Simon Wiesenthal as some kind of saint. The less
Learned of us do hang on to what experts
Say. Some people do not question the stuff that comes out of experts mouths. Because they are experts- they wouldn’t lie to us would they!? Lazy research, lazy reporting and a somewhat Gullible audience ensure that this stuff gets about. But how do we know if we are being spoon fed crap. It’s really hard for Jo public in general to have confidence in what they read- unless they read in blind faith. I have in the past! Who holds the authors to account? How can this fakery be stopped from being printed? Who can stop it? How do they check the authenticity?
I could write a book on making a cake. But it would taste like an ice machine. Still, I’d have sold books!
Totally agree Guy. Especially as in my experience the deniers aren’t widely read. They have tended towards the lightweight on the facts section of the bookshop.
The only way to confront deniers is with hard, indisputable facts. There has been a flurry of these very ropey accounts, aimed at the generalist reader. Pre-covid a colleague was reading one these accounts, can’t recall which but it had been specifically called out by the Auschwitz Memorial. I advised her of this fact, her response was to suggest maybe they didn’t like it because it challenged the orthodoxy. No, it’s rubbish I told her. Facts, facts, and facts!
An important and eloquent article - thank you. Once these stories take root it’s very difficult to weed them out and they can alter the historical narrative over time. We owe it to those who lost their lives to ensure the truth is kept alive.
And you say you aren't a 'historian'! You do more to correct duff history than many and that is SO important. Gaining as true an evidenced narrative is essential - especially when others try to hijack a popular historiography for their own ends, bravo!
It is very sad that some people feel the need to tell untruths such as this.
Obviously I agree that there is no place for inaccuracy in anything relating to the Holocaust, which is why I have a huge amount of respect for those who put all the hard work into finding out the truth, or otherwise, behind some of these narratives.
A question, though, if I may - why do people like Avery do it? Do you think he was simply and cynically trying to reap the rewards of something he knew perfectly well never happened? Or did he 'improve' on something real until the real story came to be encased in a thick carapace of self-aggrandising fiction? Or was there some actual trauma which he managed to cover up by creating a narrative in which he was more in control, more the hero and benefactor, than he managed to be in real life? In short, did he come to believe any of this stuff?
'Old men forget, and all shall be forgot - but we'll remember with advantages what deeds we did that day' ...
Few narratives of any sort are indisputable; plenty involve wishful thinking, selective memory, literary 'improvement' and revision; when the subject is the Holocaust, though, the stakes are perhaps uniquely high. I very much agree with you that publishers these days have a real obligation to run any Holocaust narrative past someone - ideally, several people - with deep scholarly knowledge of the sources, existing narratives and, yes, existing fakes. And there is literally no excuse at all for Hodders to keep the wretched Avery book on sale.
Very much agree. There are a number of notorious ‘tellers of tall tales’ Christopher Lee for example. But there is something particularly noxious about those who chose to present fictional memoirs of the Holocaust. What responsibility do publishers have to undertake due diligence and not take these at face value, they do as much harm to our understanding of the Holocaust as certain pyjama based ‘children’s’ books.
This fakery boils my ****. Auschwitz Memorial are fantastic at setting the score strait especially on Twitter.
Until your “Hunting Evil” I looked on Simon Wiesenthal as some kind of saint. The less
Learned of us do hang on to what experts
Say. Some people do not question the stuff that comes out of experts mouths. Because they are experts- they wouldn’t lie to us would they!? Lazy research, lazy reporting and a somewhat Gullible audience ensure that this stuff gets about. But how do we know if we are being spoon fed crap. It’s really hard for Jo public in general to have confidence in what they read- unless they read in blind faith. I have in the past! Who holds the authors to account? How can this fakery be stopped from being printed? Who can stop it? How do they check the authenticity?
I could write a book on making a cake. But it would taste like an ice machine. Still, I’d have sold books!
Totally agree Guy. Especially as in my experience the deniers aren’t widely read. They have tended towards the lightweight on the facts section of the bookshop.
The only way to confront deniers is with hard, indisputable facts. There has been a flurry of these very ropey accounts, aimed at the generalist reader. Pre-covid a colleague was reading one these accounts, can’t recall which but it had been specifically called out by the Auschwitz Memorial. I advised her of this fact, her response was to suggest maybe they didn’t like it because it challenged the orthodoxy. No, it’s rubbish I told her. Facts, facts, and facts!