Babi Yar: history and significance

¶ … survival and the Holocaust in literature. Specifically, it will contain a response to Dina Pronicheva's account of surviving the massacre at Babi Yar. Babi Yar was a ravine in Russia, where the Nazi SS massacred over 33,000 Jews. This is the story of one young woman who survived the massacre, and her experience leading up to the shootings. It is difficult to read, and more difficult to comprehend.

Reading about any Holocaust survivorship is demanding at best, because the images of suffering, cruelty, and misfortune are so difficult to comprehend, and to believe. It is hard to believe that anyone could cause so much misery without any conscience, and even justify it by race. It is difficult to believe that an entire race of people was so passive they allowed themselves to be manipulated by a few. It is difficult to believe that women, children, and the elderly were all summarily reduced to bodies and ash, and it just kept happening. The Holocaust was a nightmare for the Jews, it is still nightmarish to read about, and Dina Pronicheva's account is as demanding as any other is, because it is true, and because it signifies the deaths of so many thousands of others.

From the beginning, Dina is uneasy about the removal of the Jews from Kiev, and she feels there is something not right about the situation. She remembers, "She wasn't yet sure what it was, but she sensed with her whole being that these people were not being sent away" (Anatoli 102). Sadly, the Jews trusted the Nazis, and had no idea of the atrocities to come, and so the Nazis led them like lambs straight to the slaughter. Dina recognizes more quickly than most what their fate will be, and she is powerless to do anything about it.

The atrocities begin almost immediately as the Nazis march the prisoners toward their fate. The atrocities are the most problematical thing to read about, because the utter cruelty of the Nazis comes out, and it is hard to imagine how any human being could treat another so monstrously. How does a human suspend all humanity and treat others worse than animals? The text describes the Nazis as "drunk with fury in a sort of sadistic rage" (Anatoli 106). It is hard to see what would drive rational creatures to act so irrationally, but the truth is they did, and they continued to act irrationally and sadistically throughout the war. The massacre at Babi Yar is only one incident of thousands, and that makes it even more difficult and horrible to comprehend.

Dina survives because of her wits, and pure luck. Her experience is gruesome and nightmarish, and she sees and experiences things no human should be forced to experience. If someone had written of these things in a fantasy or horror novel, no one would have believed they could have actually existed. She survives the pit mostly by a miracle, and survives after that with a combination of sheer determination and luck that the Germans do not find her, and when they do, she encounters the only man with a heart it seems, in the German Army. That she survived at all is a testament to her determination and strength, but that she survived, and managed to find her children after the war says even more about her fortitude and sheer force of will.

The story does portray a few of the Germans as humane, but mostly they are monsters, high on killing and on destruction. The same hatred exists in the world today, and again, it is based on race and religious beliefs. The sad thing is that the same kind of atrocities could, and do happen in today's "enlightened" world. Famine and "racial cleansing occur in Europe and Africa, and Muslims still execute Jews and Christians for their beliefs. It is quite frightening to see that we, and a planet, have not learned lessons from massacres such as the Holocaust, and still persecute and maim because of belief and misunderstanding. Dina's story is meant to give a glimmer of hope, because she survived, and many others like her managed to survive. However, it is discouraging and disheartening when the realization hits that the same thing can still happen today, and there would still be people like Elizabeth, who follow orders to save themselves at the cost of others.

Reading this account is also quite eye opening. Seeing what the Jews endured during the Nazi regime makes many of the problems we face today seem trivial in comparison. Life is much simpler now, even if there are complicated issues that face us every day. Basic survival is not an issue, and neither is living life in constant fear. Dina experienced these things, and somehow managed to survive, and then put them behind her. It seems we are not so strong today, and that many of us would not survive in the conditions that Dina managed to live in. Life is difficult and demanding, but nothing is as demanding as simply staying alive in a world determined to liquidate you. Reading this makes the reader understand just how easy life today is, and how lucky we are to live the lives we live today, without care, and with many conveniences.