Sophie Scholl

So, most people reading this who know me will know I’m obsessed with Sophie Scholl.  

 

She’s tied in first place for my favorite person in all of history, right along with Anne Boleyn.  For those of you who haven’t heard of her, Sophie Scholl was a part of an underground resistance movement in Munich known as The White Rose.  It was a group of students who resisted the Nazis by distributing anti-Nazi leaflets in Munich and across Germany.  None of them were Jewish.  All of them were of middle-class origin and could’ve turned a blind eye to what Adolf Hitler was doing to their country.  But staying silent was not an option for them.

                Sophie Scholl and her brother Hans were caught distributing leaflets at the University of Munich in February 1943.  They were given a farce of a trial and then executed, along with Christoph Probst, another White Rose member.  In all, 6 of the members were executed.

                Several years ago, I wrote the poem below as part of my assignments for the Eastern Virginia Writing Project.  Since then, I’ve also written a children’s book about her that I hope to get published.  Last summer, my fiancée and I went to Munich simply to walk where she walked and visit her grave.  All the pictures on this post are pictures I took while there.

Freiheit

You, the curtains of your hair hiding

your face like a game of hide-and-go seek.

But they’ve already found you and hidden

you away, awaiting your confession.

Not that they need one.

 
You, who threw the leaflets from the steps.

Determined, defiant, deliberate.

So many find their futures there,

while you found your demise.


You, fear and conviction seeping through

the pores of your young, you’re oh so young, face.

 You, not a decade gone from

childhood games and clothes but

a lifetime away from the

smiling girl you’d been.

Facsimiles of the leaflets at the University of Munich.

Fritz won’t understand.

 You, you will never be a girl again.

 You, thrown in a cell and encouraged to take it back.

You’re young, you’re so young, they say and you can’t mean it.

Just take it back.

You say it again and take a broken arm in the process


 You, writing “freedom” on the paper that

took it away from you. Hands shaky as you

etch your creed onto your condemnation.

 You, they found your brother too, and he’s older

but he’s barely a man and he’ll never get a gray hair.

Christoph in another cell, his children shall grow

and surpass the greatest age their father ever was.

You, marched to the guillotine as you try not to cry.

The final meeting with your parents in your mind.

They can muster questions of “why” but they can’t muster

disappointment because they gave you this fight.

You, you’re so young, will stay this way.

 You, you’re so right, a part of the true solution.

You, you’re so young, will pave this way.

For the rest of us.

 

“Such a fine sunny day, and I have to go, but what does my death matter, if through us thousands of people are awakened and stirred to action.”—Sophie Scholl’s last words.

 *So, when I started doing research about The White Rose, I found out that although there were rumors, there was never any proof that Sophie’s arm was broken during her interrogation process.*

Irena Sendler and the Children of the Warsaw Ghetto

               

 

  Picture books are some of the most important books in the world.  They offer our children insights into the past, the present, the future, and what might be.  They show them that anything is possible, and offer scaffolding through picture support.  Pictures books are not just for little kids, but can be enjoyed by kids of all ages, and even adults.  I recently read Irena Sendler and the Children of the Warsaw Ghetto, by Susan Goldman Rubin, and when I finished, all I could think was how important it is that this story exists in a picture book. 

                As an undergraduate, I was a double major in history and religious studies.  I took a class solely devoted to Germany after 1918, a class all about The Holocaust, and many other classes that touched upon World War II.  Never, in any of those classes, did I hear about Irena Sendler.  It was not until I read this picture book that I learned of this fascinating woman.  It took me aback, knowing that someone who was well-educated in this time had never heard of this woman, and it filled me with promise, knowing that this book now exists to share her story with our children for years to come.

                The story starts, not with the birth of our main character, as so many biographies do, but with the invasion of Poland.  Irena Sendler was a Catholic social worker who, from the beginning, resisted the Nazis.  The Warsaw ghetto was a place of horrific starvation, disease, and death.  Irena and other nurses were allowed into the ghetto to help with the spread of typhus.  When news came that the Nazis were planning on transporting the ghetto’s occupants to Treblinka, a death camp, Irena and others knew they had to act.

                Most of Irena’s story is something that I am familiar with—that of hiding Jewish children with nuns and other non-Jewish peoples.  I knew of hidden Jewish children, but could not ever tell you the name of any of the people who helped to save them, until I read this story.  I remember in college hearing the story of the hidden Jewish child.  Jewish parents knew that if their children stayed with them, they would most likely die.  Being selfless, parents handed their children over to stay with someone else for the duration of the war.  Irena and other brave individuals helped children to escape through sewers, under floorboards in ambulances, in fire trucks, body bags, coffins, or any other means of getting those children out of the ghetto and to safety.  Irena was even able to smuggle a baby, Elzbieta Ficowska, out in a carpenter’s wooden box.

Many children had to be hidden, moved, and hidden again and again.  There are stories of children who, after the war, could not return to their homes and families because they couldn’t even remember who they originally were.  Irena Sendler details how Irena wrote down the names of the all the children whom she helped save, and buried it to keep the identities of the children safe.  Because of her, many children could find their families again, and many more were able to escape certain death at the hands of the Nazis.

                Bottom Line: This book is important, and would be a great addition to any teacher’s unit on World War II.  I think that this book would not really be appropriate for children below 4^th grade, and I would only introduce this story to elementary school children with some context. 

Title:  Irena Sendler and the Children of the Warsaw Ghetto

Author/Illustrator:  Susan Goldman Rubin/Bill Farnsworth

Publisher/Publishing Date:  Holiday House/ 2011