André Schwarz-Bart

French novelist of Polish-Jewish origins. Schwarz-Bart is best known for his novel The Last of the Just (originally published as Le Dernier des justes). The book traces the story of a Jewish family from the time of the Crusades to the gas chambers of Auschwitz.

Schwarz-Bart's parents moved to France in 1924, they were deported to Auschwitz in 1941 together with two of his brothers, Jacques and Bernard, neither of them returned. Soon after, Schwarz-Bart, still a young teen, joined the Resistance, despite the fact that his first language was Yiddish, and he could barely speak French. It was his experiences as a Jew during the war that later prompted him to write his major work, chronicling Jewish history through the eyes of a wounded survivor.

Schwarz-Bart stayed all of his life loyal to the Zionist movement and to Israel. The memorial of Yad Vashem in Jerusalem has chosen the words from his book, The last of the just, to paint on the wall.

The prayer for the dead, is interwoven with the names of concentration camps and death camps.

And praised. Auschwitz. Be. Majdanek. The Lord. Treblinka. And praised. Buchenwald. Be. Mauthausen. The Lord. Belzec. And praised. Sobibor. Be. Chelmno. The Lord. Ponary. And praised. Theresienstadt. Be. Warsaw. The Lord. Vilna. And praised. Skarzysko. Be. Bergen-Belsen. The Lord. Janow. And praised. Dora. Be. Neuengamme. The Lord. Pustkow. And praised… Amen.