Nine Suitcases

Béla Zsolt

1947

These nocturnal passenger trains in wartime have their own peculiar sounds. The deportation wagons have a way of screeching, like an eagle or a vulture—whereas this kind of train whines and groans as if beseeching, then grinds its teeth in furious impotence, not so much like a beast of burden but like an overburdened man bent double, whose heart…

Please login or register for free access to Posen Library
Register
Already have an account?
Engage with this Source

Creator Bio

Béla Zsolt

1895–1949

Novelist, poet, journalist, and politician Béla Zsolt was born in Komáron, Hungary. He worked in Budapest for a number of radical Hungarian newspapers before becoming editor in chief of the radical weekly A Toll. During World War II, Zsolt was deported to a labor camp in Ukraine. He was later sent to Bergen-Belsen and from there to Switzerland, as part of the Kasztner group. After the war, Zsolt returned to Hungary and in 1947 was elected to parliament. His work Nine Suitcases was one of the earliest Holocaust memoirs.

You may also like

The Language of the Third Reich

People are forever quoting Talleyrand’s remark that language is only there in order to hide the thoughts of the diplomat (or for that matter of any other shrewd and dubious person). But in fact the…
View Source

Notes of a Social Democrat

The time has come for me to touch upon the people of the Vilna leadership. When Iosif Mil was away and I joined it, the acknowledged leader was my acquaintance A[rkady] Kremer (“Aleksandr”). His…
View Source