99 - all you should know about the Genocide April, 2014 | Page 3

A lot has been written about the Genocide, and much continues to
be written. The list of publications includes scientific documents,
archival records, historical monographs, eyewitness memoirs,
analytical articles and fiction.
The issue of the Genocide is by nature a difficult one, and reading
anything on this topic is not a pleasant activity by any means.
Anyone picking up a book about the Genocide must have a
convincing reason to justify to himself why he keeps turning the
pages to read horrifying descriptions of death camps, why he keeps
following the fate of orphans condemned to a certain death, and
why each eyewitness memoir causes him to mentally place himself
or his family at the center of those ominous events.
Perhaps the most important reason is that in a universal tragedy,
there is no individual pain. Misfortune does not embrace one
person alone. All the deprivations and bitterness are shared,
nothing is individual.
When a person reads a book, whether it is fiction or a historical
record, he is mentally transported to the time period being
described or recreated. At the center of those terrible events, the
reader becomes an eyewitness to crimes and a judge of the era.
Today, we are obliged to read some of the narratives that the
victims of the Genocide have experienced first-hand. Sharing their
suffering in this way is the very least we can do. If only through
silent reading, we must accompany those who were alone and
rejected as they made their way to a certain death. They do not
need this. We do.