Surviving the Survivors: A Memoir

Ruth Klein’s story is about merchants and landowners—aristocratic Polish Jews. It’s about horrific refugee and concentration camps, displacement, and unimaginable suffering. About parents who survived the Holocaust but could not overcome the tragedy they had experienced, and about their children, who were indirect victims of the atrocities endured by Holocaust victims.

After their liberation, Klein’s parents were brought to the Displaced Person Camps in Germany, where they awaited departure to the United States. They were traumatized, starving, and impoverished—but they were among the survivors.

Once in America, however, their struggles didn’t end. Ruth tells how, time after time, her parents had their dreams broken, only to rebuild them again. Klein also shares what it was like to grow up with parents who were permanently damaged by the effects of the war. Theirs was a dysfunctional household, full of tumult and violence. Ultimately, however, Klein’s upbringing gave her a keen appreciation for the value of life—and made her, like her parents, a survivor.