Defiance

You gotta love any story where, in the movie, a Jewish hero gets played by the same guy who played James Bond.Tuvia Bielski was a real-life character who, with his brothers, saved 1,200 Jews from the Holocaust in the forests of Belorussia. He didn't stop at being a Jewish bandit or gunslinger, which he might have done; he insisted on saving as many of his fellows as possible, including a large number of civilians, total strangers, unable to fight - women, children, old people. This largesse was almost unknown among the partisans. Each life he saved was one that almost certainly would have been annihilated otherwise.This and the accompanying movie are a timely telling of the Bielski story, timely because more attention is being paid now to the Holocaust inside the former Soviet Union, inaccessible during the Cold War. The Communists suppressed this history for any number of reasons, including the collaboration of local peoples in the killing of the Jews in their midst, their own anti-Semitism as expressed in the purges, and because Communists were never going to lead inquiries into genocide. Glass houses, etc.This story's milieu will be unfamiliar to many readers - the small towns and primeval forests of Western Belorussia, land Polish before 1939, invaded by the Russians after their non-aggression pact with Hitler in 1939, overrun by the Germans in 1941, only to be retaken by the Soviets in 1944 and finally (for now) to become part of today's Belarus in 1989. The Bielskis were rural Jews, who farmed amidst their Belorussian neighbors, who knew the back country and how to survive there. Many other Jews in this story are rural or small town people, types unfamiliar to American Jews.Tec doesn't supply enough historical background for my taste; I wanted to know if these were the remainders of the shtetls of the Jewish Pale, or if these had dissipated by this time and the Jews more intermingled in the surrounding communities. She notes a large percentage of the Bielski group were uneducated people, working class before the war. I'm unclear whether this was the makeup of the Jews of this area generally, if it reflects the Nazi targeting of Jewish elites for annihilation, or if it reflects who survived to get to the forest.The book would have been improved by better maps. The only one included in the softcover version was cursory, barely a line drawing, that didn't include most place names referenced in the book. And the book needs more reference to outside military history. It may sustain the mood to tell it entirely from the partisans' limited viewpoint - unclear what nearby Germans were doing - but I'd like a better description of why the Nazis vanished after a summer 1943 anti-partisan offensive, torching nearby towns and murdering or deporting a lot of non-Jewish residents, only to reappear in mid-1944 just before being finally vanquished. Did they pull back to the major population centers, leaving the towns and villages unsecured? Or did they vacate the entire area, leaving only their front armies to retreat in disorder back through it almost a year later? The Bielskis, no longer having to move every few weeks, take this opportunity to build their forest camp into a small town complete with tannery, gun repair shop, synagogue and Turkish bath. If the area was that devoid of Germans for an entire year, though, where was the Red Army?Some of Tec's story is surprising, showing conventional timelines of the war to be incomplete - for instance, there are still Jewish ghettos in Belarus in the summer of 1943, when the destruction of Polish Jewry has already been completed, the Warsaw Ghetto now a smoking ruin for several months, and Auschwitz turning farther afield to Hungary, Greece, and Yugoslavia for Jews to provide grist for its death mill. She might want to explain this further. The Belarus chapter is still being added to the Holocaust canon.Tec's telling is studious, a bit too much at times. A retired sociology professor, she too often lapses into abstractions or sociological analysis when she could be documenting more historical facts instead. There is much rumination about Tuvia Bielski's role as a charismatic leader. It's clear he was one; say so and move on.She makes numerous passing references to fighting missions the Bielski partisans participated in, yet describes almost none of them, despite her access to many surviving partisans who undoubtedly could have supplied her with more. This in turn may feed criticisms that perhaps they didn't really fight much.She values their having saved lives, yet remains skeptical about the notion of fighting the Germans. Underlying her skepticism is the attitude that this was some foolish male need for revenge, and perhaps she thinks telling war stories also a foolish male preoccupation. She never seems to get her arms around the concept that these were Jews who fought, and who fought as Jews, on their own terms, protecting their own - not only from the Nazis but from non-Jewish partisans, bandits, peasants, and the Soviets - when no one else would, and that this was not only survival or respect for life, it was an amazing blast of dignity, a heroic story. And that most of those among the Bielskis who died, died fighting, with their boots on, not as victims, an inspiration to . . . well, to people less academic than Nechama Tec. That the Bielskis protected unarmed civilians and to some extent avoided combat to favor that mission, is notable, admirable, unique and heroic, but Tec seems not to value resistance itself. Don't get me wrong, I am not questioning the Bielskis in the least; whatever decisions they made were proved right by history, by their survival and by having saved saving so many lives. I am questioning Tec's seeming need to question whether that kind of resistance was worth it.She does spends an entire chapter, meanwhile, on the role of women in the forest - who slept with whom on what terms. Despite efforts at objectivity, she cannot withhold her own judgment, or class prejudices, when considering why more refined women, having linked up with lower-class protectors in the forest, often stayed with them after the war. "Yet, after the war, like Sulia, most of the women continued with the men they had married in the forest. When I asked why they did not change their seemingly unsuitable partners the women had no answers." Hello? Maybe they fell in love with them? Maybe they felt they owed their lives to them? Maybe they had kids with them? Maybe everyone they ever knew from their own social class, was dead? Maybe they discovered these were good men even if they hadn't read Proust in the original French? Maybe not every woman waits for Mr. Perfect forever, or wants to? Maybe they weren't part of today's divorce culture? She finds no inherent merit in the long marriages that resulted. She seems to admire women in the forest who rejected men entirely, and refuses to be at all judgmental of those whose sexual favors were offered freely and perhaps variously. She saves her greatest skepticism for those who found a man, who waited a while before yielding sexually, and who then stayed with him for good. What's up with that?Although Tec's style grates on me, it takes away but marginally from her otherwise very good work - one unlikely to be replicated, as firsthand witnesses have died since her interviews with them and as the camp's own official account was confiscated to disappear down the Soviet memory hole. Tec, who herself survived in Poland as a hidden child, undoubtedly could open doors with the survivors based on language and common history. She has interviewed dozens of eyewitnesses, does her best to cross-check facts and notes conflicting accounts where she can, and frequently cites the Bielski family's own memoir, unpublished in English.More recent books on the Bielskis may put their story in better historical perspective, but this is as good as it's going to get on how it looked to those who were there.

I don't recommend this book if you like good writing or if you want an even portrait of the three Bieliskis, as the book is mostly about Tuvia. I wanted to go deeply into the story of the community, and I was tempted to skim parts, trying to find those pieces.As far as the writing, the book reads more like a draft than a carefully constructed piece. Tec mentions the names of many people she interviewed, but their voices are not distinct from her own. It sounds like she uses quotes to confirm her point of view, not create it.There were "holes" in the content from the start. For example, it would have been more meaningful if the Forward had been written by a survivor, or by someone in the Organization of Partisans, Underground Fighters, and Ghetto Rebels, which initiated the project. Movie producer Edward Zwick, who did write the Forward, could just have easily written an epilogue.Much of the book focuses on how Tuvia interacted with the Russian army and neighboring peasants. As written, the book made it sound as if conditions were not as severe as they actually were--sufficient food was often available because there were many peasants to "help," and safety was mostly consistent because the Bieliskis were able to work things out with the Russian partisans and gain protection. Perhaps these things were true and my understandings were too influenced by the movie. (The movie was not as 'gritty “or ambitious as Shindler's List, but it's worth watching, and it left me wanting to know more.)Tec also does quite a bit of editorializing, For example, she says that the group "had to travel light." What does that mean? It would be more factual and meaningful to know what they carried. Tec tells us that Tuvia's wife resisted setting up an interview. Tec’s tone suggests this was somehow wrong, which is a serious assumption in a book that claims to be fact.The ending focuses on how Tuvia "failed" in "regular society. Failure is perspective. If he "failed," he should of said so, not Tec, who inferred this. Worst of all was to say, "I believe that till the last day of his life he missed this time, longed for it.” Really? He missed the Shoah? Astonishing—or terribly cruel.

I haven’t read it yet; I ordered it yesterday and it was on my doorstep today - great service!!I have the movie on DVD and I’ve watched it literally a half-dozen times. I noticed in the credits that it was a true story and based on a book.The book/story is 298 pages and then there is approximately 100 pages of endnotes..!! I cannot wait to dive into this book.

This is the basic book that led to the making of the movie. The movie was great, but not true to all of the characterizations and chronology of events. But the point of the movie was to show the amazing accomplishments of the main characters.Also: Asael met Chaya before they were in the forest and she had a steady boyfriend. Tuvia spoke four languages fluently and as it turns out was the best choice for l#1 leader. [He spoke and read German among them.] Asael was older than Zus. Asael was #2 in command. The movie gives a different impression. But hints at Asael's abilities.Tuvia was interested in saving as many Jews as possible. He did this quite well. Killing Germans was not his top priority.I won't spoil anymore about the book.It's a "long read" because of all the notes and references explaining details about smaller and competing groups and other individuals. I found that a little annoying, but it is not meant to be a light novel.Read the book! It is worth the time you put in!!!! When you see the movie again you will see how it all really fit together.

This is a story about the Bielski partisans who took up refuge in the Belorussian forest of Poland during the Second World War. The main character being Tuvia Bielski, the leader of the Bielski Otriad partisan group. An amazing story of how a charismatic leader drew together fugitive Jews in the remote forests of Poland and set up a resistance camp that endured not only the persecution of the Germans but also to an extent of other resistance groups, especially those headed by Russian military advisors. What is truly enlightening is that Tuvia Bielski did not set out to seek revenge from the Germans but to save Jewish lives...his was servitude to `save' not to `take' lives. His outstanding leadership qualities are only too apparent as he manages to negotiate and organise the survival of over 1200 people in this hostile environment. In doing so he built a self sufficient highly organised forest community that accepted all Jews, young or old, fit or sick...he said no to no one. The book is very descriptive covering all aspects of the main characters, Otriad life, medical services and everything else you would want to know about including an in depth account of `partisan love lives'. The book also covers Otriad executions, the armed struggle against the Germans and the inevitable horror of mass Jewish executions and much more. I saw the film first before buying the book and of course the film has been given a Hollywood licence to thrill through excessive military engagements where help has been timed to the nano second. I find this a pity as the book contains enough drama within it to please anyone. The common thread of the book is followed through the film but it does not do the book justice as the book is a gem and the film is...well okay!

A good true story, worth a read

Excellent book. Amazing true story of endurance and hardship.

What brave people... an amazing film.. at times gripping!We are SO fortunate to live in the times we do not to have to experience life like this.A MUST watch film

Inspirational true story of persecuted Jews in World War Two who escape to the forests and survive against the odds