Bread on My Mother's Table A Danube Swabian Remembers
Ingrid Andor
Can the world accept ethnic Germans as victims of World War II? Are there similarities in the Holocausts that the Jews and the ethnic Germans suffered? Will Germans always be perceived as stereotypical villains, even those who are innocent victims? Can this book help heal the wounds of those forced to be unpopular, unacknowledged victims because of their ethnic heritage?
Bread on My Mother’s Table: A Danube Swabian Remembers examines the effects of the hidden genocide that occurred at the end of World War II in which a family of ethnic Germans in Yugoslavia was condemned to be victims of expulsion, ethnic cleansing, and forced labor in concentration camps at the hands of Russian and partisan soldiers.
In a tapestry of episodes and family portraits which comprise this literary memoir, the author weaves a tale which illuminates, compares, exposes, and shares a family’s history and their journey from feast to famine, from farmers to prisoners, from refugees to immigrants, and from American citizens to land owners once again.
This is the story of one family’s quiet struggle and victory over adversity told by a first generation progeny who takes the reader on a parallel journey of rediscovery and acceptance of her cultural identity.
LOCAL AUTHOR EXPOSES CONTROVERSIAL GENOCIDE OF GERMANS IN POST-WORLD WAR II YUGOSLAVIA
Chicago, IL - The subject of Serbia’s involvement in genocide is explored again in a unique, new family memoir recently published by local author Ingrid Andor. The recent publication of BREAD ON MY MOTHER’S TABLE: A Danube Swabian Remembers reveals the controversial and little-known post-World War II ethnic cleansing and expulsion of ethnic Germans, called Danube Swabians, from Yugoslavia.
Maria Andor as a refugee in Austria
Andor’s mother, Maria, then 15 years old, was held captive with her family in a partisan-run concentration camp in Kruschiwl, Yugoslavia from 1944-1948. Maria’s family’s sagaof denationalization, occupation, enslavement in concentration camps in Yugoslavia and deportation to labor camps in Russia, and their subsequent survival as refugees in Europe and immigrants in Chicago is featured in this thoughtful, highly personal, and sometimes, painful memoir by her first generation Chicago-born daughter who, through the writing of the book, comes to accept her own confusing ethnic identity and the involvement and victimization experienced by the Danube Swabians during the aftermath of World War II.
In explaining her reasons for writing the book, Andor says, “Admittedly, the idea of a German victim of World War II is an oxymoron and a difficult concept for many to accept in a world in which we have been conditioned to just the opposite. However, I grew up in this confusion, and in the need to understand who my family was, why I was born to it, and what I was supposed to do, the topic not only chose me but pursued me relentlessly for years.”
Author Ingrid Andor (center) with family members mentioned in book.
ABOUT THE BOOK Andor’s book, published well over 60 years after the horror of the Holocaust, deals with its painful aftermath in the lives of an ethnic German family who suffered the backlash of retribution that destined them to live as unpopular, misunderstood, and unacknowledged victims of World War II. The book is not a historical text, a political diatribe, or a sociological/psychological treatise on ethnic cleansing or immigration. Rather, it is a creative, personal artifact in the genre of literary memoir. Time expands and contracts throughout the book in a tapestry of episodes and family portraits designed to explain the present in terms of the past.
There are many books which examine the war atrocities suffered at the hands of the Germans during World War II. Other than a few internationally published historical texts, there are few books of creative nonfiction published in America which examine the suffering experienced by the ethnic Germans at WWII’s end. Approximately 15 million ethnic Germans were expelled from their homelands in eastern Europe. Prior to their expulsion, they were interned in concentration camps, and 874,000 of their able-bodied were deported to Russia as slave labor to serve as war reparations for the Soviet Union’s participation in defeating the Nazis. Forty-five percent of those deported perished in Russia, with a totalof two million dying as a result of enslavement, starvation, and expulsion. It is time that this issue is raised and addressed for the students of genocide, that the silenced voices are heard, and that the healing continues not only for the Danube Swabians but for all victims of ethnic cleansing worldwide.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR The author of BREAD ON MY MOTHER’S TABLE: A Danube Swabian Remembers holds a master’s degree in linguistics from NortheasternIllinoisUniversity and has been a freelance journalist for the Lerner Newspapers, a corporate copywriter, a marketing professional, a poet, and, most recently, a reading and writing instructor for ESL college students in Chicago. Three of her poems, Thy Will Be Done, Spiritual Swimmer, and Passion Play were published by Tenacity Press in 1997 in an anthology entitled COURAGEOUS JOURNEYS, and an excerpt of her book, entitled Saturday Night at Oma’s, was published by Crown Publishing in 2000 as a short story in GIFTS FROM OUR GRANDMOTHERS.
Upcoming Events and Appearances
Come visit with me at the author's table:
April 26-27, 2008 Landsverband Meeting (Detroit,MI)
Carpathia Club 3800 Utica Road Sterling Heights, MI 48312
May 3, 2008 Discussion and Reading (Chicago, IL) Jefferson Park Library 2:00 P.M. 5363 W. Lawrence Avenue Chicago, IL 60630
May 25, 2008 Memorial Day Picnic (Chicago, IL)
American Aid Society of German Descendants 259 W. Grand Avenue Lake Villa, IL 60046
June 8, 2008
Reading and Book Signing
12:00 - 1:00 p.m.
North Shore Center for Spiritual Living
Evanston Masonic Temple
1453 Maple Avenue
Evanston, IL 60201
June 15, 2008
Father's Day Picnic
Milwaukee Donauschwaben Club
Milwaukee, WI
June 22, 2008
Musikfest
American Aid Society
Lake Villa, IL
July 4, 2008 Independence Day Picnic (Chicago, IL)
American Aid Society of German Descendants 259 W. Grand Avenue Lake Villa, IL 60046
August 3, 2008
Tag der Donauschwaben
American Aid Society
Lake Villa, IL
August 24, 2008
Heimatfest
American Aid Society
Lake Villa, IL
August 30-31, 2008 USA/Canada Danube Swabian Convention (Cleveland, OH)
Danube Swabian German American Cultural Center 7370 Columbia Road Olmstead Township, OH 44138
Author Interview on KUNM
Listen to author interview from public radio show, KUNM, "Women's Focus," with host Carol Boss.
Click on the link below
File is 45 Mb and will take several minutes to download
