While I was cleaning out my refrigerator, I was half-watching Book TV until I heard a little of an incredible story and gave the TV my full attention. .
The speaker was Doris Ackerman who recently wrote a book called The Zookeeper's Wife: A War Story.
Because I came in the middle of the talk, I am not positive about some details, although I do know tje great courage and kindness had to do with the Warsaw Ghetto in Poland during World War II.
Antonia, the zookeeper's wife, harbored many persecuted people in the zoo, this was a time when to give a Jew a cup of water was punishable by death. This was such an example of ordinary people rising in extraordinary situations. It was as if Antonia and her husband were keeping the whole world together.
I'm not sure of the couple's last name. Something like Delinsky though I don't think that is the exact name. I didn't hear how many people's lives they saved, but they saved everyone who came to them (with the exception of two who died natural deaths while they were in hiding). Not only did this couple save lives. They were determined that they are survive with their humanity intact. They taught the children art and music.They transcended the meanness they were surrounded with. This seemed to me just what God in Heavenletters tells us to do.
During the war, the author said that the Nazi regime was very solicitous of animals. The regime had great understanding and love of all nature. The same people, scientists, zoologists who had such compassion for animals somehow justified genocide. It's a mystery, isn't it?
The author has written another book