Once We Were Brothers

The most important theme of these chapters is the question, “Why didn’t the Jews leave?” It is deeply unfair to retroactively evaluate the judgment of Jewish families like the Solomons who, despite possessing the means to escape, remained in Europe even as Hitler’s anti-Semitic policies spread and intensified. No matter how seriously Jews took the threat of Nazi Germany, the full extent of the atrocities that would be committed in the coming months and years was inconceivable. As Ben tells Catherine in Chapter 16, “No rational person could have conceived of the unbounded evil, of the genocide and the slaughter” (86).

Ben also argues that it is difficult to grasp the seriousness of a threat until it is seen with one’s own eyes. When Ziggy tells the Solomons stories of state-sanctioned anti-Semitism in Germany, the family is more bemused than frightened. Ben tells Catherine:

“My parents shook their heads. It all seemed morbidly unreal. Otto, Beka, and I sat there at the dinner table looking at each other like we were hearing fantastic ghost stories. To us it was all fiction. It was happening in Germany and that was worlds away from Zamosc. It might as well have been happening on the moon” (57).

This theme also feeds into the idea of homeland and how difficult it is to leave it behind, even in the face of existential threats. When Abraham meets with Cardinal Kakowski, Kakowski asks him, “if life in Poland is so dangerous, why don’t the Jews leave? Why do you stay here in danger?” Abraham replies, “This is our home […] There are over three million Jews in Poland. Are we all supposed to leave, to run from the lawless violence?” (56). Abraham’s point is this: Why should Jews leave when they’ve done nothing wrong? They are not the ones breaking the laws of the land, the Nazis are. In Chapter 12, Catherine asks Ben the same question: Why didn’t the Jews leave? Ben replies:

“Today, we look back at the Nazi scourge and shake our heads in disbelief. How could such a thing happen? Why were the Jews so meek? It’s incomprehensible, Miss Lockhart, don’t ask me, with all your presumptions, to explain why the Viennese Jews didn’t leave their homes, their community, everything they knew and loved, and respond rationally to a world bereft of reason” (71).

It is too much, Ben argues, to expect people to react sanely to a world gone mad.

Once again, it is helpful here to consider historians’ perspective on the matter. According to the political scientist Raul Hilberg, the persecution of Jews came not all at once but in stages, as the Nazis used a highly calculated playbook that followed a progression of dehumanizing acts. Hilberg identified these stages as such: first, identifying Jews and “otherizing” them; second, isolating Jews from mainstream society; third, the “ghettoization” of Jews to segregated sections of European towns and cities; fourth, the deportation of Jews to concentration camps; and finally, mass extermination. (Hilberg, Raul. The Destruction of European Jews. Holmes & Meier. 1985.) As Ben’s story progresses, he sees these stages play out before his very eyes.

Even Jews with the means and desire to flee Europe faced major roadblocks. According to a 1939 issue of Fortune magazine, 83 percent of Americans opposed the admission of Jewish refugees from Europe. (“Fortune Quarterly Survey: XII.” Fortune. July 1938.) Populist demagogues like Father Charles Coughlin espoused a doctrine of “America First” that exploited anti-Semitic fears to promote the otherization and rejection of Jewish immigrants. The novel’s exploration of these issues is in many ways relevant to current debates in the United States and Europe over the refugee status of immigrants escaping violence in places like Central America and Syria.

These chapters also give voice to the youthful sense of resistance felt by Ben and Otto. As young people, Ben and Otto welcome a fight against the Nazis. Ben tells Catherine, “We were kids. We were indestructible. If the Germans dared to come to Poland, we’d wipe them out” (59). One of Otto’s proudest moments is when he comes to the defense of Beka against anti-Semitic street gangs. But when the fight comes directly to Zamosc, Otto and Ben are both quickly disabused of these noble notions of resistance. Ben recalls, “We had practically nothing to use against aircraft or armored vehicles. People gathered their hunting rifles and shotguns. We were throwing pebbles at the apocalypse” (88). Although their circumstances are vastly different, Ben and Otto’s disparate responses to the Nazi invasion reveal much about their character. While Otto will eventually relent and join the invading army, Ben never loses his courage and moral fiber in the face of ultimate evil.

Finally, these chapters introduce the novel’s central love story between Ben and Hannah. Recalling the night of the dance, Ben says, “My Hannah, she’s light as a feather. So easy to lead. So soft to hold. Her flowers, her perfume, her hair, they fill my senses. The warmth of her face next to mine—it’s intoxicating” (63). Here, Balson—and by extension Ben—uses a narrative technique of switching to the present tense during a particularly vivid memory. Especially when recalling events involving Hannah, Ben is transported, lost in a reverie where the memories come to life as if he experiences them anew. These moments of transcendence are later revisited in various discussions over the power of sense memory.