Treblinka Reflections

Friends - I write this morning from Warsaw after having a short time to reflect on the events of yesterday. We started the day visiting the remnants of the Warsaw Ghetto, and then followed the path from the Umschlagplatz platform (from where the cattle cars departed) to Treblinka - an extermination camp where 870,000 Jews perished in just over a year. What struck me yesterday was the remarkable efficiency with which the Nazis carried out the extermination here. And, while my tendency is to attempt to intellectualize all of this, and seek explanations, I find that I am without words. If it makes sense, which it may not…I can get the “reasons” without the “whys” - and as such, I am currently just trying to absorb everything.

One other thing that I found intriguing: the memorialization is incredibly understated. In my field, I am used to overwhelming (often bombastic) monumentation tying sacrifice to nationalism, honor, and fortitude. This is, and I will add this respectfully so, somber remembrance that inspires the telling of tragedy. It inspires difficult conversations revealing the fates of individuals, families, or communities that once thrived, but now exist only as memories. Such stories are profoundly difficult stories to hear, as I am certain they are to tell.

My travels so far have added another dimension to my study of places of memory, and the strange juxtaposition of horror with what is now both peaceful and beautiful.

Many of my students find it difficult to envision the scenes at such places - terrified people being led to their death, processed in around 20 minutes. It is difficult because the surroundings reveal nature in all its glory. So much of this trip has been difficult to process. This is only one thing among many, and interestingly, it is one aspect of traveling to sites of historical import I have encountered before. Battlefields: my students often remark how so much suffering took place in such beautiful places. To them it simply does not make sense. I suppose they are right about this.

With compliments,

Keith