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4 April 2012 Word count: 1584 Wilkomirskis Lies: the Deterioration of Historical Reality

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Binjamin Wilkomirskis Fragments is an alleged memoir of a child who survived the Holocaust. The publics reception of the fictional piece exemplifies humanitys taste for simulacra that simplify reality. This essay will explore how Fragments evoked a

quintessential trait of our societythe preference for uncomplicated worldviewsand how its falsity undermines the lives and stories of true Holocaust survivors. Some maintain that it does not matter if Wilkomirskis Fragments is true because it can be read as a novel. Norman Geras argues that the book can be read independently of its author and his intentions []. It can be read as though it were indeed fiction (117). The problem with this argument is that Wilkomirskis work is indeed fiction; the events described never occurred. Fragments cannot be read separately from a consideration of the person who wrote it if one deems it better [] than [other] Holocaust novel[s] (Geras 122). A memoir tacitly promises its authors remembrances, ineluctably interlocking writer and memories into a single, interdependent phenomenon. One cannot sever that link because the book elucidates Wilkomirskis persona and the events from that time; the memoir is incomplete without its author and the author incomplete without his memoir. Moreover, reading Fragments as a novel contributes to the overwhelming displacement of historical analyses of the Shoah by literary interpretations. As Professor Yerushalmi points out, there is no doubt whatever [the Holocausts] image is being shaped not at the historians anvil, but in the novelists crucible (qtd. in Sicher 66). Apparently we are living in a society where the emotional appeal of a comforting story is preferred over the (nearly) objective examination of historical events. People would rather read about a heroic

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protagonist bit[ing] with all [his] strength (Wilkomirski 436) at a guard in a concentration camp rather than actual accounts, like Nathan A.s: They used to throw the earth on top, and the earth used to go up and down because they are living people: Onethe son bury his mother; the mother was still alive: Moyshe, ikh lebh; bagrub mikh nisht lebedikerheyt [Moyshe, Im alive; dont bury me while Im alive]. But Moyshe had no choice, because the Germans no give him the choice. And he bury alive. (Bernard Donals and Glejzer 2) When asked if Moyshe buried his mother alive, Nathan shrugs his shoulders without any facial expression (ibid.). As Wilkomirskis numerous awards demonstrate1, there is a

preference for his emotional description of courageous deeds over Nathan A.s ostensibly cold but true report. Thus, reading Fragments as a novel due to its literary appeal undermines real accounts, placing pleasure above facts. Such hedonism leads to the creation of a Holocaust industry that dominates its cultural reception. The Americanization of the Holocaust (Sicher 56) is the most prominent

example, where Hollywoods portrayal of the anti-Semitic pogroms during WWII shapes the collective memory of the Shoah. Analogously, Wilkomirski resorts to the ubiquitous usage of archetypical motifs in order to entertain and emotionally hook his public. Many of the elements from Joseph Campbells monomyth are included in his autobiography. From the start, we read that a woman is carrying [the protagonist] (Wilkomirski 380) and so, [a] journey begins (Wilkomirski 382). Campbell describes that the first stage of the

mythological journey [] signifies that destiny has summoned the hero and transferred his spiritual center of gravity from within the pale of society to a zone unknown (58). Hence, the woman takes the protagonist against his will into what Campbell calls the belly of the !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
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whale, where the hero [] is swallowed into the unknown and would appear to have died (90). But, as Wilkomirski emphasises, he survived and is the living contradiction to logic and order (378). Furthermore, he stayed alive thanks to Jankl and Motti. He states [he] owe[s] [his] life to Jankl (Wilkomirski 431) and echoes of the belly of the whale resound during the scene where Motti, the only person [Wilkomirski] could tell about what [he] was afraid of (397), tells the story of Jonah and the whale. We thus encounter the archetypical protective figure [] who provides the adventurer with amulets against the dragon forces he is about to pass (Campbell 69) and a reinforcement of the belly-of-the-whale motif. In addition, the book is structured to present contrasting emotions side by side. Our spirits raised as the bull-necked man starts playing with [the children] (Wilkomirski 435) and crushed with the little one[s] forehead (Wilkomirski 436). The writer constantly interjects seemingly positive events between catastrophes in order to lift up our hopes, just as the guard lifts the ball in the air (Wilkomirski 436), in order to make the fall harder. As Philip Gourevitch notes, despite Wilkomirskis explicit repudiation of artifice, and his ambition to present a narrative composed of pure memory, his book does have a design. Almost from the beginning, scenes from the war and the camp are intercut with scenes from the boys life after the war (qtd. in Geras 121). This alternating series of emotions ends on a positive note: our boy hero changes from being always the one whos left behind (Wilkomirski 382) to a member of a community he claims to have brought together; his heroic deeds teach other survivors that they are not alone (Wilkomirski 496). Wilkomirski presents himself as a child hero through the appeal of emotion and archetypes. This depiction of the protagonist as a heroic figure with a happy ending despite numerous misfortunes is typical of fairy tales. Wilkomirskis account is preferred over others, such a Nathan A.s, because it is familiar and comfortingreaders have encountered the same characteristics throughout their life. So, rather than trying to accept the behaviour of

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people in dire situationslike the son burying his mother alivethey choose to stay in a philosophical comfort zone. Thus, Fragments contributes to the phenomenon whereby

shaping the memory of the Holocaust has become a cultural artifact with tenuous relevance to the historical events (Sicher 56), and reinforces the idea of the myth of the Holocaust (Maechler 315). Yet people endorse it. Moreover, Wilkomirskis portrayal offers a simple dichotomy, a division of the world into victims and villains (Maechler 307). All the ethical dilemmas associated with the Shoah can be quickly whisked away through Wilkomirskis biography: support the narrator and side with the good guys. A simple act of empathy is all that is needed to efface any complex moral issues. If we let ourselves be seduced by this sentimental lure, the value of real survivor remembrances will be significantly undermined. The purpose of sound historical research is lost because people are willing to tolerate factual inaccuracy as long as they are entertained. The consequences of Wilkomirskis lies reach deeper. Jean Baudrillard explains that now [i]t is a question of substituting the signs of the real for the real (2). This is exactly what Wilkomirski didhe presented the symptoms of having lived in a concentration camp by utilizing general known facts to simulate his experience. Accordingly, he relates how he moves his feet in his sleep because he had to do this as a child to protect himself from the rats at Majdanek (Maechler 264), which sounds like a plausible scenario even though there was no plague of rats in the camp (ibid.). Wilkomirskis extensive research allowed him to pretend having lived in Majdanek. Since people believed him and even rewarded him, this means that one can simulate a Holocaust survivors experience without having even been there. In fact, simulations are even better! As Maechler points out, most of the victims of those days [] suffer under the unbearable realization that they can neither integrate their experiences into their personal life stories nor express them in appropriate and communicable

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ways (307). Independent of the emotional turmoil of reliving such experiences, this supports Baudrillards point that the real is what cannot be represented (108). Concomitantly, were Wilkomirskis lies ignored, this would belittle the true survivors accounts and it would mean that the real can be produced from miniaturized cells, matrices [and thereby] [i]t no longer needs to be rational, because it no longer measures itself against an ideal or negative instance (Baudrillard 2). Wilkomirski is then allowed to claim there were rats in Majdanek despite evidence rendering it irrational. Hence, peoples actual life stories are rendered irrelevant because they cannot express them in a familiar discourse. The Wilkomirski affair teaches us that our society values simulation more than reality, neglecting the struggles actual survivors from the Holocaust face when trying to express their stories and ridiculing their truth. There are some who argue that Fragments is a valid account of Wilkomirskis life because it might represent his emotional experiences through the language of the Holocaust. Bernard-Donals argues that Bruno Doesseker, as Binjamin Wilkomirski, told the story of events lost to memory through that other vocabulary, and what he has told is the story of another survival (123). Those people are the present-day simulators [who] attempt to make the real, all of the real, coincide with their models of simulation that Baudrillard warns us about (2). They would rather discredit countless survivors to uphold their simulation model, one that eases life into a familiar environment of two opposing, disconnected ethical positions. Wilkomirski himself states that his childhood memories [are] exact snapshots [] and physical sensations (377)he avows a physical certainty in his recollections. Such a lucid disclaimer invalidates Bernard-Donals reading. Wilkomirskis Fragments shows us that our society is more ready to accept a comfortable lie than face harsh reality. It is even willing to undermine the importance of reality itself in favour of pleasant simulations, neglecting the struggles of a group of people who suffered ineffable horrors. We cannot overlook the fact that Wilkomirskis book is a

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series of confabulations that do not represent reality; this is the first step towards reclaiming the real we have been losing.

! Works Cited

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Baudrillard, Jean. Simulacra and Simulation. Trans. Sheila Faria Glaser. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1995. Print. Bernard-Donals, Michael. Blot out the name of Amalek: Memory and Forgetting in the Fragments Controversy. The Journal of the Midwest Modern Language Association, Vol. 33/34, Vol. 33, no. 3 -Vol. 34, no. 1 (Autumn, 2000 - Winter, 2001), pp. 122-136. Web. 1 April 2012. Bernard-Donals, Michael, and Richard Glejzer. Between Witness and Testimony: Survivor Narratives and the Shoah. College Literature, Vol. 27, No. 2 (Spring, 2000), pp. 1-20. Web. 28 March 2012. Campbell, Joseph. The Hero With a Thousand Faces. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1968. Geras, Norman. The True Wilkomirski. Res Republica, Vol. 8, No. 2, pp. 111-122. Web. 27 March 2012. Maechler, Stefan, and Binjamin Wilkomirski. The Wilkomirski affair: a study in biographical truth. New York: Schocken Books, 2001. Print. Sicher, Efraim. The Future of the Past: Countermemory and Postmemory in Contemporary American Post-Holocaust Narratives. History and Memory, Vol. 12, No. 2 (Fall/Winter 2000), pp. 56-91. Web. 28 March 2012.