Fragments: From a Childhood, 1939-48 - Tapa dura

Binjamin Wilkomirski was a tiny child when the round-ups in Poland began. His father was killed in front of him, he was separated from his family, and found himself completely alone, three or four years old, in Majdanek death camp. Moved from camp to camp as the years went on, in 1945 he was half-kidnapped, half-rescued from an orphanage in Cracow and hidden in a group of children going for adoption in Switzerland. Once there, his new family never allowed him to talk about his previous life. Overshadowed by terror, he saw everything unfamiliar as a potential instrument of death, like the ski-lift on a school skiing trip. Only in adulthood did he find a way to recover his memories.