Schreie Von Frauen in Gestreiftem Kleidern the Jewish Feminine Experience of the Holocaust in Select Holocaust Novels

Abstract

Holocaust, a part of the dreadful Second World War, has snatched away the lives of common newlinepeople in general and sown a psychological scar on their mind during that time. It is in fact, newlinecropping up from the battleground to the human psyche as a horrible apparition in order to newlinetraumatize people. Especially, the plight of the womanhood in particular during the Holocaust newlineknows no bound in the Nazi concentration camps where they are maltreated, forcefully deported newlinefrom their family, disrobed, and raped resulting in the formation of docile bodies . However, the newlinepresent thesis has been divided into seven chapters, including Introduction and Conclusion, in newlinewhich I seek to explore the female experience during the Holocaust period. newlineIn Chapter-1, I try to exhibit how self- amputation of William Styron s Sophie, the newlineprincipal character, has been a driving force while German society becomes too much abusive newlineupon her, and she consequently falls upon the thorns of life and bleeds thereby. Her children are newlineabducted, her love Nathan (ab)uses her physically and mentally; above all, her psychological newlineturmoil owing to the lack of true companionship creates a void in her mind that leads her to be newlineentangled into numerous futile relationships. In fact, the more she is interacting with others newline(especially her lovers), the more she realizes she ethical responsibility towards them. Such newline others being the infinite is incumbent upon Sophie which is conducive to the formation of a newlineclaustrophobic ambience for her wherein she combats with her past on a daily basis and newlineconsequently resorts to suicidal policy to uproot herself from the dungeon. newlineIn chapter-2, I try to point out how the woman becomes the victim of the sexual politics newlineat one hand, and on the other, the same woman destroys the lives of other women. When the newlineHolocaust period demands the feminine solidarity, the heroine of the novel The Reader, makes newlinethe existence of other women unbearable. Hanna, Gertrud and the survivors of the Church fire newlineaccident showcase different