Age Group:
AdultsProgram Description
Event Details
As a journalist, writer and author, Max Friedman has spent his working life discovering and then writing hundreds of stories about other people — seeking to communicate what was most precious and compelling about their lives. With Painful Joy, set for publication on Holocaust Remembrance Day in April 2022, he turns his writing experiences to an area he had avoided for most of his life — seeking to understand and learn in great detail about the lives of his parents. He and his sister Rachel were born in Sweden to Sam and Frieda, Holocaust survivors who grew up in poverty in Poland, and met and married there after their liberation from the infamous Bergen-Belsen concentration camp. The family emigrated to the US in 1952 seeking a new beginning. But for Sam and Frieda, their lives before the Holocaust and their horrific experiences during the war, when they lost just about everyone they ever loved, held them back from any life that could be considered normal. That was true for their children as well. His father spoke about the war just once. His mother spoke seemingly every day about the camps, sometimes as bedtime tales. About five years ago, when Max was prompted to find out more, he discovered that the little that his parents had told him were mostly reimagined fragments of complicated realities. In Painful Joy, he shares with readers what really happened to them. It is the hardest story he has ever had to write. Books will be available for purchase and signing. This event is sponsored by the Friends of the Library.
Please note that this will be a hybrid event. Participants are invited to join us in person or via Zoom.