Culture For The Non-Cultured

I finally saw the movie version of Defiance yesterday. The story touched me profoundly: Polish Jewish people who hid from the Nazis by living in the forest, led primarily by the three Bielski brothers. The community mainly was just that — a community — with shelter and organized division of labor and, eventually, nurseries and schools. The survivors numbered 1,200 by war’s end, and their descendants are now about 10 times that many.

(All those people who may never have walked the Earth if the community leaders had not existed boggles the mind).

After the war, 2 of the brothers who started the community immigrated to New York City, where they started a trucking business.

The movie was OK, but, like most movies, had one-dimensional characters and oversimplification of plot. Serves to get the world out, though, since the Bielskis never once asked for recognition.

I must read the book, though — I’ve heard it’s quite good.