Book Review - Milena

Margarete Buber-Neumann’s Milema is an account of one of the millions of tragedies that took place in the last century. Her friendship with Milena Jesenka is an example of a relationship the intensity of which can only be created in adversity. Indeed, the word friendship does not do it justice. Margarete points out that not all German’s were beasts, mentioning in particular an SS Overseer Langefeld. I started reading the book to do research on Soviet vs. Nazi concentration camps. It did not satisfy this need but I could not put the book down. It is not without criticism however. Margarete quote Milena at length about the superior qualities of the Czech people. I am sure she would have been disappointed had she lived. The Czechs did not behave all that nobly following the peace. The Nazi had their Lidice. The Czechs had their Horní Moštěnice. Horní Moštěnice was a far greater atrocity than Lidice, but unlike Lidice there was no movie made about it and it was completely forgotten. She also mentions that a “hundred and twenty students and schoolchildren were killed” by the Nazis during a protest in October 1939. The internet claims that two people were killed during this protest. I suspect that the internet figure is closer to the truth. Exaggeration damages one’s credibility.