Past Without Shadow

Zohar Shavit is Professor at the Unit for Culture Research, Tel Aviv University. Her many books include Poetics of Children's Literature and several books in German on the History of Books for Jewish Children in the German-speaking world. Shavit is also known for her translations of American children's classics, among them her translation of E. B. White's Charlotte's Web, which received the Hans Christian Andersen Medal for distinguished translation.

"...[S]imply fascinating. Where is Germany going if its children learn to remember things that constitute a distortion and falsification of their past?." -- Elie Wiesel, author of Night"I have no doubt that this book will become a basic study in both the field of children's literature as well as the analysis of postwar German society." -- Omer Bartuv, Haaretz"Shavit's shocking research is a reminder that those who don't want to remember the past may be paving the way for such tragedies in the future." -- Joseph Lapid, Minister of Justice, Deputy Prime Minister, Jerusalem"Zohar Shavit's book about the unique strategies employed by authors of children's books in Germany in their presentation of the past image of the Third Reich is a cultural bombshell and piques special interest." -- Orit Prague, Maariv"For many years Shavit has devoted herself to the image of the Shoah presented in West German children's literature and has thus caused a growing disapproval. Controversy is fierce-launched not only from the right wing and not only in Germany but from the extreme left and in Israel as well...Shavit's insights are astounding because they sound so crystal-clear, because they make sense and are enlightening." -- Michael Maier, Frankfurter AllgemeineZeitung

• Introduction to the English Edition Part 1: The "Story" of the German Past and the Construction of its Past Image 1. The Development of German Books for Children on the Third Reich and World War II 2. Keys to the Past Image 3. Construction of the Past Image Part 2: Strategies in the Construction of the "Story" Preface to Parts II and III 4. "Present, but not in Place" 5. "The Dream of the Thousand-Year Reich" - The Borders of the Reich and the Boundaries of Time 6. "Some of my Best Friends ... " - Philo-Semitic and Anti-Semitic Descriptions of the Jews 7. "Not the Way it Looks" - Nazis and Pseudo-Nazis 8. "If Only I Could ...." - An Analogy between Jews and Nazis Part 3: Whose War Was It? 9. "The Whole People ... " - The Scope of the Resistance Movement 10. "Actually, I Myself was a Victim" - The Germans as Victims 11. "I'm not Guilty" - The Germans and Guilt Part 4: The Construction of an Alternative Discourse 12. "Seeing it Differently" - An Alternative Narrative. Conclusion: The Image of the Past in German Public Discourse and Texts for Children