Goals:
To analyze closely testimony from the Holocaust.
To express in poetic form meanings the students
created in their analysis.
Materials: Copies of survivor, rescuer,
or liberator testimony; calligraphy supplies or
computers for the variation.
Background: When American soldiers liberated
the Nazi concentration camps in 1945, they
were stunned and outraged by what they saw. Here is a reaction that
was recorded at the time:
Our men cried. We were a combat unit. We'd been to
Anzio, to southern France,
Sicily, Salermo, the Battle of the Bulge, and we'd
never, never seen anything like this.
In the children's cell block, the bedding, the clothing,
the floors besmeared with
months of dysentery. I could put my fingers around
their upper arms, their ankles, so
little flesh. Two hundred and fifty children. Children
of prisoners. Polish children.
Czechoslovakian children. I can't remember what
I did after I saw the children.
Barbara Helfgot-Hyett, a poet, was so impressed with remarks like these
that she rearranged the
words as poetry. The book that she created by this method is called
In Evidence. Compare her
version below of the preceding comments. What different impressions
do the words make when
written as prose and as poetry?
Our men cried.
We were a combat unit.
We'd been to Anzio,
to southern France,
Sicily, Salermo,
the Battle of the Bulge,
and we'd never, ever
seen anything
like this.
In the children's cell block,
the bedding, the clothing,
the floors besmeared with
dysentery. I could
put my fingers around their upper arms,
their ankles, so little flesh. Two hundred
and fifty children. Children
of prisoners. Polish children.
Czechoslovakian children.
I can't remember
what I did
after I saw the children.
When one reads these testimonies as poetry, the words seem to grow in
intensity. The same
shock and heartbreak are present in both versions, but the second format
somehow brings out the
emotions more powerfully. Maybe this is because of the way the poet
decided to break up the
sentences. Notice the words that are placed at the end of lines for
emphasis. Notice also the way
certain phrases are emphasized because they have an entire line to
themselves. Notice how the
reader pauses at certain points and is forced to focus on specific
words and details.
Before she began to edit the passage, Barbara Helfgott-Hyett obviously
recognized that it was
every bit as intense as a poem. What she did by re-shaping the words,
therefore, was to release
and reveal a little more of the emotional conviction that she felt
within the lines. She not only
responded in a creative way to writing that impressed her, but she
literally analyzed it, too.
Remember that by definition, analysis requires us to break something
up into its basic parts;
when we analyze a passage from a book, we look at the nature and function
of every word or
sentence within that passage.
Procedure: Choose a passage about the Holocaust
at least three sentences long, but no longer
than five sentences altogether. Add no words of your own, except for
a title. Do not abridge or
paraphrase the passage you select. Decide in advance which words will
matter the most in your
poetic expression of the text. Will you use key words to start or end
the lines? Which phrases
will gain impact by standing on lines alone? Which phrases will benefit
by being stretched over
two or more lines? Are there any repetitions or internal relationships
of words that you can
showcase by creating more that one stanza?
Be sure to save all your rough drafts; that way you can explain your
decisions. Practice reading
your poem aloud to see the effect.
This activity was created by Donald J. Peet.
Variations: Keeping with all of the guidelines mentioned above, students may also:
Use a computer to set the lines of their poems, carefully
choosing appropriate fonts, styles,
and point sizes.
Use calligraphy pens to hand letter their poems.