One Woman in the War: Hungary 1944-1945

About this book

Before the publication of this book Alaine Polcz was widely recognized as a psychologist ministering to the needs of disturbed and incurably ill children and their families as the author of numerous articles and several books on thanatology and as the founder of the hospice movement in Hungary. The autobiographic account of the experiences of a woman then 19-20 in the closing months of the Second World War. When it was first published in 1991 the book was a revelation of past horrors in Hungary which until then had lingered on in the farthest reaches of the national memory as rumor and suspicion about the violent acts committed against women during a time of chaos havoc and savagery. The literary world quickly recognized the merits of this book: It was highly praised by Hungarian reviewers awarded prizes and has already been translated into French Rumanian Slovenian and Serbian.