The Book Smugglers of The Vilna Ghetto: Choosing a Life of Meaning Under the Specter of Death

Dr. David Fishman

David E. Fishman is a professor of Jewish History at The Jewish Theological Seminary, teaching courses in modern Jewish history. Dr. Fishman also serves as director ofProject Judaica, JTS's program in the Former Soviet Union (FSU).

Dr. Fishman is the author of numerous books and articles on the history and culture of East European Jewry. His most recent book,The Book Smugglers: Partisans, Poets, and the Race to Save Jewish Treasures from the Nazis (ForeEdge, 2017) was the recipient of the Jewish Book Council’s 2017 National Jewish Book Award. The Book Smugglers has been hailed as "Monuments Men for book lovers" and "first rate scholarship that pulses with the beat of a most human heart."Dr. Fishman is a dynamic and engaging teacher and has taught in diverse Jewish communities across North America.

Rabbi Elijah, the Vilna Gaon (1720-1797)

Vilna: A Center of Hebrew and Yiddish Printing

The Strashun Library and the Great Synagogue

Reading Room of the Strashun Library

The Yiddish Scientific Institute, YIVO

YIVO reading room YIVO teacher courses

Other Collections

- S. An-sky Museum of the Jewish Historical Ethnographic Society.

- Educational Institutions: Yeshivas, Hebrew and Yiddish Teachers’ Seminaries .

- Synagogues, houses of prayer and study (kloyzn).

- Private collections: rabbis , scholars, writers.

Young VilnaSeated in the center: Shmerke Kaczerginski and Abraham Sutzkever

Vilna Ghetto, 1941-1943

Entrance Gate to the Vilna Ghetto

Service Rank Insignia of the Einsatzstab Reichsleiter Rosenberg (ERR)

Dr. Johannes PohlJudaica Expert for the ERR

Book with stamp of the FrankfurtInstitute for the Investigation ofthe Jewish Question.

Herman Kruk (1897-1944), Librarian, Head of “Paper Brigade”

Zelig Kalmanovitch, YIVO scholar, deputy head of the Paper Brigade

Shmerke and Sutzkever in the Vilna Ghetto, July 1943

Shmerke and Sutzkever with their friend and co-worker Rachela Krinskyin the Vilna ghetto

Sorting Books in the YIVO Building

Portion of Torah Scroll from Vilna made into a boot-insert

Lithuanian Police at Gate to Vilna Ghetto

The Book Bunker at 6-8 Shavel Street

From Abraham Sutzkever’s Poem, “Grains of Wheat” (1943)

As if protecting a babyI run, bearing Jewish words,I grope in every courtyard:The spirit won’t be murdered by the hordes[…]

And I dig and plant manuscripts, Perhaps these words will endure,And if by despair I am beat, And live to see the light loom -My mind recalls: Egypt, And in the destined hourA tale about grains of wheat. Will unexpectedly bloom?[…]

Nine thousand years have passed! And like the primeval grainBut when the grains were sown – That turned into a stalk -They blossomed in sunny stalks The words will nourish,Row after row full grown. The words will belong

To the people, in its eternal walk.

Ona Simaite (1894-1970)

Shmerke and Sutzkever as Partisans

Shmerke Sutzkever

Klooga Concentration Camp, Estonia

The Stutthof Camp, near Danzig/Gdansk

Ruins of Vilna Gaon’s Prayer-House 1944

Sutzkever in front of the ruins of the YIVO building

From left to right: Abraham Sutzkever, Israel Zeligman, and Gershon Abramovitsh, with a wagon of recovered materials and objects, July 1944

The materials are sorted, July 1944. Sitting on right: Abba Kovner (Commander of the United Partisan Organization of the Vilna Ghetto), in center: Abraham Sutzkever

Shmerke Kaczerginski with rescued art and newspapers

Mikhail Suslov

Head of Lithuanian Bureau of the

Communist Party

With Joseph Stalin

Jewish books and documents at the Vilnius Trash Administration

Sutzkever’s suitcase for transporting documents out of Soviet Lithuania(in the National Library of Israel)

מזוודת הפח של אברהם סוצקבר

From Left: Shmerke, Sutzkever, Yitzhak Zuckerman (leader of Warsaw ghetto uprising), and Chaim Grade (poet and novelist from Young Vilna).

Warsaw, 1946.

Rachela Krinsky with her daughter Sarah (Irena). Poland, 1946.

St. George’s Church, VilniusBook Chamber of the Lithuanian Soviet Social Republic

Theodor Herzl’s Diary (in YIVO, New York)

Record-Book of the Synagogue of the Vilna Gaon(in YIVO, New York)

Rare Yiddish Books(in National Library of Lithuania, Vilnius)

Medical Manual (1843) Prayers for childbirth (1837)

Letter by Sholem Aleichem (in YIVO, New York)

Posed Bust of Leon Tolstoy by Sculptor Ilya Gintsburg(in Tolstoy Museum, Moscow)

Concert Program of the Symphony Orchestra of the Vilna Ghetto(National Library of Israel)

Call for Armed Resistance, Vilna Ghetto(Moreshet Archive, Israel)

The Rescuers

Abraham Sutzkever(in Israel)

Shmerke Kaczerginski (in Buenos Aires)

Rachela Krinsky with her husband Abraham Melezin, in New York City (1949),

Rachela with her husband, daughter and granddaughter in New Jersey (1982)