There were moments when he felt something soft, something acutely sensitive vibrating within him. He, who until now had been a 'surface' person, who … - Chava Rosenfarb

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There were moments when he felt something soft, something acutely sensitive vibrating within him. He, who until now had been a 'surface' person, who had been able to call everything by its name with so much self-assurance, and who had had such a concrete sense of reality, began to feel uncertain and vague, to experience a bitter-sweet indeterminate craving, as if something crippled yet trembling with life was desperately trying to break through the thick icy core inside him, crying to come out. (chapter 1)

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About Chava Rosenfarb

Chava Rosenfarb (9 February 1923 – 30 January 2011) (Yiddish: חוה ראָזענפֿאַרב) was a Jewish Holocaust survivor and author of Yiddish poetry and novels, a major contributor to post-World War II Yiddish literature. She lived in Lodz, Poland in her childhood, and moved to Canada in 1950.

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I have no idea that at the same time in the United States of America, Theodore Adorno has come out with the sweeping declaration that to write poetry after Auschwitz is barbaric. A meaningful, powerful declaration, but it has nothing to do with me. The rhythms surging inside me deny his statement. I think of my father, who prodded me to write, even in the ghetto. I think of the poet Shayevitch, who wrote poems even in the camp, just days before he was sent to the gas chamber. They too deny Adorno's statement. As long as there is life, the human heart will never cease singing of its joys and sorrows. Up to the brink of the grave, man clings to his song, just as he clings to life. Moreover, those who feel the urge to sing, even when their throats emit only a whimper, or a screech, do not ask whether or not they ought to sing. Soon the philosophers will come, Sartre and Camus. Camus will say that life is absurd, nothing but the efforts of a Sisyphus. But the fact that he considers it important to write down his view of life proves just the opposite. Life without song, without spiritual expression, is absurd. Song gives meaning to the travails of Sisyphus.

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I don't analyze or rationalize about art, about form and style. Everything is clear as day and comes to me as easily as if I were a medium and some other voice were dictating the lines. Within me there is both calm and agitation. I don't want to only memorialize. I want to salvage my inner melody, so as to be able to continue with my life.

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