Abstract

For those whose access to the Holocaust is purely through its postfactum representations, visiting associated sites in Europe is a way of bridging this postmemory with reality. The contemporary experience of Holocaust sites by post-Holocaust generations provides a practical dimension to their perception of the Holocaust, sometimes even evoking a sense of witnessing the Holocaust itself. Consequently, for children of Holocaust survivors, these trips can provide a tool for bypassing the process of secondary witnessing and attempting to become a primary witness of the Holocaust: “She felt annoyed to have been bitten by a fly, in Auschwitz. Still, to come out of Auschwitz with only a bite was something other inmates would have prayed for. She stopped herself. It was not other inmates. It was just inmates. She was not an inmate. Others, clearly distinct from her, were there. She was not there.” 1 Visiting Auschwitz allows Ruth, protagonist of Lily Brett’s Too Many Men, to classify herself as an inmate. By assuming this identity of a Holocaust victim, she attempts to become a primary witness. Yet this process is essentially futile – how can someone become a witness to something they did not actually live through?