The Holocaust in Eastern Europe : At the Epicenter of the Final Solution

Waitman Wade Beorn's The Holocaust in Eastern Europe provides a comprehensive history of the Holocaust in the region that was the central location of the event itself while including material often overlooked in general Holocaust history texts.

First introducing Jewish life as it was lived before the Nazis in Eastern Europe, the book chronologically surveys the development of Nazi policies in the area over the period from 1939 to 1945. This book provides an overview of both the German imagination and obsession with the East and its impact on the Nazi genocidal project there. It also covers the important period of Soviet occupation and its effects on the unfolding of the Holocaust in Eastern Europe. This text also treats in detail other themes such as ghettoization, the Final Solution, rescue, collaboration, resistance, and many others. Throughout, Beorn includes detailed examples of the similarities and differences of the nature of the Holocaust in various regions, in the words of perpetrators, witnesses, collaborators, and victims/survivors.

Beorn also illustrates the complex nature of the Holocaust by discussing the difficult subjects of collaboration, sexual violence, the use of slave labour, treatment of Soviet POWs, profiteering and others within a larger narrative framework. He also explores key topics like Jewish resistance, Jewish councils, memory, and explanations for perpetration, collaboration, and rescue. The book includes images and maps to orient the reader to the topic area.

This important book explains the brutality and complexity of the Holocaust in the East for all students of the Holocaust and 20th-century Eastern European history.

“Beorn has produced an excellent and accessible survey on the history of the Holocaust in Eastern Europe. Individual chapters could readily be used to shape or supplement primary source readings in introductory and upper-level undergraduate courses on the Holocaust. Moreover, the footnotes and “suggested reading” lists at the end of each chapter will undoubtedly provide instructors with ideas for other works that they can include on their future syllabi.” – H-Judaic

“Beorn provides a fine overview of numerous key issues surrounding the Holocaust in Eastern Europe … [A] critical, concise and clear overview of current trends in Holocaust research, as they relate to some of the Holocaust’s main actors and sites of genocide … [The] volume offers valuable background information, sources and questions for addressing one of the greatest catastrophes of our time.” – German History

“Beorn’s brief survey of the Holocaust focusing on eastern Europe, where the worst horrors occurred, is readable and useful for a wide variety of readers … [It] takes into account the latest primary and secondary sources and provides useful maps, data, photographs, and helpful notes … The chapter on Jewish resistance is particularly insightful. Summing Up: Recommended. All levels/libraries.” - CHOICE