A dark thriller set mainly in GLASGOW
Novel set mainly in WW2 Auschwitz/Birkenau
11th December 2018
The Tattooist of Auschwitz by Heather Morris, novel set mainly in Auschwitz/Birkenau
I wanted to read this novel because mentions of it – overwhelmingly positive – kept popping up in my timeline on various Social Media platforms. On Amazon UK 83% of ratings are 5* as I write. As at 19/12/18 the book has been 9 weeks in The Sunday Times Top Ten paperbacks. It is fairly rare that a book garners quite so many accolades.
The opening chapters describe Lele’s arrival and entry through the stark gates of Auschwitz/Birkenau (two camps separated by a mere 4 kilometres). Arbeit Macht Frei (work is freedom) is the mantra worked into the ironwork.
He is chosen by the working tattooist – der Tätowierer as he is called by the guards – to join him, as he ploughs through the daily arrivals, tattooing identity numbers into the wrists of the inmates. At first he balks, especially when faced with the gentle sex. He cannot imagine how it has come to this, that the green ink he uses has to mingle with the blood he draws as he gets to work with his needle. It is certainly not a pain-free process.
He is soon reconciled to his marginally elevated position in the camp because he is able to help other prisoners by sharing his meagre rations with his fellow inmates. As the Tätowierer he knows he also has a better chance of survival. He is also allowed to travel between the two camps depending on where he is needed and this slight freedom is a bonus.
Soon he sees Gita and it is love at first sight. The novel essentially charts their story of stoic survival against all the odds, set for 3 years amidst the hard-to-imagine conditions. It is a narrative “based on the powerful true story of Lale Sokolov“. The author conducted a research visit to Auschwitz/Birkenau, made a visit to Lale’s home town in Slovakia and spoke with the couple’s son.
The book’s real merit is that it this very dark period of human history to readable life. It is is written in an easy-to-read manner that presents this period of horror, perhaps to a new and younger generation. The writing in many ways is simple, however, without much psychological depth. The novel serves to highlight the inhumanity of the time, behaviour that should never be forgotten or glossed over, especially in the current political climate around the world.
Having said that, there was just an inkling that the research was slightly awry. Penicillin – acquired by Lele for Gita, who was at death’s door with typhus in the camp – wasn’t, for example, actually available during WW2. Coincidentally an article in The Guardian now highlights other inconsistencies in the narrative (read more: The Guardian). Further, Gita’s prisoner number is cited throughout the text but it is incorrect according to the Guardian report. This begs the question as to how much a fictionalised account can override and supersede the actual ‘true story’, which of course is one of the book’s selling points.
The author describes at one point how Lele (because of the perks of his job, allowing him greater access to more food than the average prisoner) is despised. This never actually gets explored, the focus is more on his generosity and selflessness; it feels a very positive slant to have taken but not very ‘real’ and balanced somehow. The group and individual dynamics, both emotional and psychological, of innumerable people clustered together in insanitary and harsh conditions, with ritual humiliation and torture, is never explored. The narrative thus relies on depicting horror without much depth.
Indeed, the author describes terrible things: Mengele and his inhuman practices, the stereotyped SS dolts who supervise the camp’s prisoners, the near death experiences, the persecution, hardship and defilement. And yet. This feels like a lightweight treatment of a heavyweight subject.
For me novels like The Good Doctor of Warsaw by Elizabeth Gifford, The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas by John Boyne and If This is a Man/The Truce by Primo Levi offer the gravitas and insight that this period of history deserves. The Tattooist of Auschwitz feels more populist and rather lacks authority and congruity. It is however very readable.
Tina for the TripFiction Team
You can check out the original Auschwitz Memorial concerns about the facts here
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One article I read suggested that the interviews by Morris with Lali had an eye on a possible Hollywood film as in who could possibly play certain parts. I’m always disappointed when Holocaust fiction is tweaked as this novel appears to have been. There’s enough human drama there without the need to do so.
I’d add “Fateless” or “Fatelessness” by Imre Kertesz, a miracle of a novel as a young boy survives the camps by somehow keeping his mind from knowing the worst, always focused on survival. There is wonder and depth in this Holocaust novel that it seems is partly lacking in the book reviewed, and I wonder why the facts couldn’t be right, especially about something as clear to find out as the availability of penicillin.