dani373's review
challenging
dark
emotional
funny
reflective
sad
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
sonne_'s review
challenging
dark
emotional
informative
reflective
sad
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
5.0
elspethm's review
challenging
dark
emotional
sad
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.5
sarah_dietrich's review
5.0
This Way for the Gas, Ladies and Gentlemen is a brutal, raw, honest collection of stories about surviving the Nazi concetration camps. Borowski himself is a survivor and the stories are based on his experiences, knowledge which makes these stories all the more horrifying to the reader. To ensure survival in the camps one must be strong and please the Nazis, which may mean doing work such as unloading freight cars full of prisoners, most of whom will go straight to the gas:
"... the wave of people - feverish, agitated, stupefied people - flows on and on, endlessly. The think that now they will have to face a new life in the camp, and they prepare themselves emotionally for the hard struggle ahead. They do not know that in just a few moments they will die..."
That Borowski was exposed to such horrors, partook in such horrors and told the world about it, makes this an enormously courageous book. Borowski saw the worst that humanity had to offer but he didn't just see it in the Nazis, he found it in himself.
"... the wave of people - feverish, agitated, stupefied people - flows on and on, endlessly. The think that now they will have to face a new life in the camp, and they prepare themselves emotionally for the hard struggle ahead. They do not know that in just a few moments they will die..."
That Borowski was exposed to such horrors, partook in such horrors and told the world about it, makes this an enormously courageous book. Borowski saw the worst that humanity had to offer but he didn't just see it in the Nazis, he found it in himself.
bookishwendy's review
5.0
How does one rate & review a book like this? I had to create a whole new GR bookshelf called "nightmare fuel" to accommodate this one. In lieu of the creative string of expletives I WAS going to use to attempt my review, I'll take a hint from my recent Dante review and post Hieronymus Bosch instead. A picture is worth a thousand swear words, after all.
The strange thing about reading a this very graphic--yet still somehow poetic--book of the Holocaust immediately after [b:The Divine Comedy|6656|The Divine Comedy|Dante Alighieri|http://d202m5krfqbpi5.cloudfront.net/books/1320552051s/6656.jpg|809248] is that it got me thinking in layers. There are plenty of layers of hell in this book but, more interestingly, there are layers of guilt. Hundreds...thousands of layers of guilt. This guilt layering is not something I'm accustomed to seeing in Holocaust literature--there is Evil and there are Victims--but through Borowski's eyes, the only guiltless person in a concentration camp is the one who dies quickly, while survivors survive because they begin to Play the Game. And it's a horrible game.
It is the camp law: people going to their death must be deceived to the very end. This is the only permissible form of charity (37).
Also, do not read this book before bed.
The strange thing about reading a this very graphic--yet still somehow poetic--book of the Holocaust immediately after [b:The Divine Comedy|6656|The Divine Comedy|Dante Alighieri|http://d202m5krfqbpi5.cloudfront.net/books/1320552051s/6656.jpg|809248] is that it got me thinking in layers. There are plenty of layers of hell in this book but, more interestingly, there are layers of guilt. Hundreds...thousands of layers of guilt. This guilt layering is not something I'm accustomed to seeing in Holocaust literature--there is Evil and there are Victims--but through Borowski's eyes, the only guiltless person in a concentration camp is the one who dies quickly, while survivors survive because they begin to Play the Game. And it's a horrible game.
It is the camp law: people going to their death must be deceived to the very end. This is the only permissible form of charity (37).
Also, do not read this book before bed.
leenamson's review
5.0
Ironically, for something that is on the disturbing books iceberg, this restored my faith in humanity.