Never to Forget by Milton Meltzer

First published: 1976

Type of work: History; young adult literature

Principal personages:

• Adolf Hitler, (1889-1945), the chancellor of Germany and Nazi Party leader, 1933-1945
• Chaim Kaplan, a Holocaust victim whose diary of his years in the Warsaw ghetto has survived
• M. I. Libau, a fourteen-year-old Berlin resident who survived Kristallnacht
• Rivka Yosselevscha, a Ukrainian Jewish woman who survived attempted execution by the German army
• Reuben Rosenberg, a survivor of four Nazi death camps, including Monowitz, the slave labor camp attached to Auschwitz
• Primo Levi, (1919-1987), an Italian chemist and Auschwitz survivor
• Abraham Lisper, a Polish youth who survived by jumping off the train transporting his family to Auschwitz and hiding for two years underground
• Sima, a twelve-year-old resistance fighter from Minsk

Overview

Never to Forget: The Jews of the Holocaust is Milton Meltzer’s highly personalized look at the attempted extermination of an entire ethnic group during the 1930’s and 1940’s. Meltzer looks specifically at the years between 1933, when the Nazi Party came to power in Germany, through 1945, the year that it lost power. During those twelve years, two out of every three Jews in Europe were murdered. These events are known collectively as the Holocaust.

The work is divided into three sections, labeled books. Book 1 deals with the history of hatred, persecution, and discrimination directed against Jews. The background of how and why the Holocaust occurred in Germany and the events leading to Adolf Hitler’s rise to power are explored in five chapters. Although Germany is the country in which modern anti-Semitism reached its zenith, the roots of discrimination against Jews goes back much further in history. The accusation that the Jews were to blame for the crucifixion of Jesus was used to make them outcasts in society as early as the fourth century. This popular and enduring hatred of Jews was systematically exploited by Hitler. Through a well-orchestrated propaganda campaign, Hitler used anti-Semitism brilliantly to unite the German people. Jews were portrayed as parasites on society and blamed for the ills of post-World War I Germany. While persecution of Jews was not new, the Nazi anti-Semitism was preached with a boundless fury, beyond the portrayal of Jews as scapegoats or inferiors to charges that they were the cause of every major problem—and thus, the solution to all problems existed in the elimination of the Jews. As the persecution and violence escalated against the Jewish population, no one intervened. Hitler continued until the plan known as the “final solution” was in place: the death of all Jews.

The “final solution,” the systematic destruction of the Jewish population as carried out by Hitler’s government, is the subject of book 2. The historic tragedy unfolds as told through first-person narratives, eyewitness accounts, and surviving diaries of Holocaust victims. Starting with November 9, 1938, the Kristallnacht (the “night of broken glass”), a nationwide German program in which the Nazis destroyed Jewish shops, synagogues, businesses, and homes, Meltzer takes the readers through the Holocaust years. Stories from the Warsaw ghetto, mass murders in Germany and Russia, and life in the concentration camps are chronicled.

Book 3 tells the story of Jewish resistance to the Holocaust. One question asked in the third part of Never to Forget is “How could the Jewish people fight back?” Another question examined is “What degree of resistance existed among non-Jews?” Hitler’s army swept over Europe with incredible speed. How could Jews who had nothing retaliate? Nevertheless, many Jews did. Resistance fighters, those who worked underground and those who organized violent rebellion, are profiled. Included in the story of the resistance is the rebuilding process that the Jews faced at the end of World War II. Those who survived had no family, no home, and a difficult future. Although the Jewish homeland of Israel was created, it was not a peaceful land. For Jews, the Holocaust had nearly been their destruction. It happened once; it could happen again.

The book is supported with maps, a comprehensive index, and a chronology. Chapter notes and source documentation are provided. An extensive bibliography is included, as well as statistical data and charts concerning the death toll of the Holocaust.

Meltzer begins with the question “Why remember?” It is his belief that the Holocaust did not occur in a vacuum. It was the logical outcome of certain conditions; given the nature of Nazi beliefs, the crime of the Holocaust could be expected. Because the world of Hitler is not totally alien to the world today, according to Meltzer, the Holocaust must be examined in order to understand why it happened and to prevent it from happening again.

This examination is at a very personal level. The author recalls how he felt as a teenage Jewish boy in the United States reading newspaper accounts about Hitler and the Nazis. Young Meltzer found the knowledge terrifying that Jewish people lived under a threat. He asked what most people would ask, “Could that happen to me?” In order to create this personal perspective of history, Meltzer relies on the eyewitness accounts of those who experienced the Holocaust. The truth does not consist of merely the facts and figures of the Holocaust but is found through the stories of those who experienced the terror and grief. Meltzer articulates the meaning of being set apart by something over which one has no control not only through his own experiences but through those of others as well. What sets Meltzer apart from other nonfiction writers for young adults is his use of a definite point of view in his work. He usually does not attempt to present more than one side of his story, and Never to Forget is told totally from the Jewish perspective.

Never to Forget also deals with the basic conflict of good against evil. The Holocaust demonstrated that all people have the capacity to be both good and evil. It is the story of those who treated other human beings as less than human and the story of those who tried to resist or held out a helping hand. Forces exist that can cut off human response and make it possible to be evil without feeling responsibility; this is how the massacre of a whole people can be organized by a government. The individual conscience vanishes in the face of orders from superiors or perceived superiors. Not enough people in Nazi Germany said “no” to the Holocaust. Meltzer wonders what would have happened if more people, not only in Germany but also in the rest of the world, had said “no.” Would the Holocaust have happened? Readers are confronted with the dilemma of what they would have done in this situation.

Never to Forget makes an important contribution to the understanding of one of the most tragic events in history by making it a personal story. The tragedy that befell one group of people is presented by sharing the experiences of a few who lived it; this approach is responsible for the powerful impact of many of Milton Meltzer’s works. This personal face on history offers a different perspective to those readers who may know of the Holocaust only from a few paragraphs in a history text or a list of facts.

Meltzer demonstrates an awareness of his audience, the young adult reader. His books seek to help adolescents become aware of themselves and their role in society by leading readers to ask “Would I have done that?” or “How could people have allowed this to happen?” Many of the voices heard in Never to Forget are those of young adults. This book can serve as validation that young people can make their voices be heard and make a difference in their world.

Twelve years after he wrote Never to Forget, Meltzer addressed the Holocaust again in Rescue: The Story of How Gentiles Saved Jews in the Holocaust (1988). This book tells the stories of some of those courageous people who aided the Jews. Once again, Meltzer puts a personal face on history by using first-person accounts to tell the story, and he leads the reader to ask “Would I be able to do that?” These two works are recommended reading for young adults studying World War II, the Holocaust, and Jewish history.

Meltzer has been quoted as saying “the writer’s voice must be heard on the pages of the book.” Whatever he writes comes out of his own personality and experiences. In Never to Forget, Meltzer’s voice provides insights to the experiences of those caught in the nightmare of the Holocaust.

Sources for Further Study

Chatton, Barbara. “Milton Meltzer: A Voice for Justice.” Language Arts 79, no. 5 (May, 2002): 438.

Meltzer, Milton. Nonfiction for the Classroom: Milton Meltzer on Writing, History, and Social Responsibility. Edited by E. Wendy Saul. New York: Teachers College Press, 1994.

Meltzer, Milton. Starting from Home: A Writer’s Beginnings. New York: Viking Kestrel, 1988.

Meltzer, Milton. “Wilder Medal Acceptance.” Horn Book Magazine 77, no. 4 (July/August, 2001): 425.

Saul, Wendy. “Milton Meltzer.” Horn Book Magazine 77, no. 4 (July/August, 2001): 431.