Author and poet Magda Herzberger is coming to Pittsburgh, sponsored by Classrooms Without Borders in association with The Kiski School. On April 14-15, she will present her Holocaust education program at Kiski. On April 17, she will speak at the Pittsburgh High School for Creative and Performing Arts (CAPA) and attend the showing of the Jewish Film Festival documentary “Defiant Requiem” at the Manor Theater. After the film, she will be part of a brief program and discussion.
The day of her Kiski appearance, April 15, will mark the 68th anniversary of her liberation from Bergen Belsen. On that very day in the camp, she was overcome with despair and simply decided to give up. She was so weak that she had to crawl to a shady tree she had long admired, expecting to die under it or be shot on her way. She remembers being surprised when no guard stopped her. Then she lost consciousness. When she awoke, a British soldier was standing over her. The camp had been liberated and her will to live was restored.
Magda Herzberger will communicate to students the power of poetry to penetrate, distill, and preserve experience, whether tragic or transcendent. She will also present a slide show of photos taken during the Holocaust, including photos taken of her in the concentration camp.