Hannah Senesh

Hero Martyr Poet The inspiring story of a remarkable life cut short. “I don’t think Hannah wanted to die for the sake of having her memory exalted in history or to prove herself equal to a romantic image she conceived for herself. Her purpose wasn’t to die. She died for her life’s purpose.” —U.S. Senator John McCain, in Why Courage Matters Hannah Senesh, poet and Israel’s national heroine, has come to be seen as a symbol of Jewish heroism. Safe in Palestine during World War II, she volunteered for a mission to help rescue fellow Jews in her native Hungary. She was captured by the Nazis, endured imprisonment and torture, and was finally executed at the age of twenty-three. Like Anne Frank, she kept a diary from the time she was thirteen. This new edition brings together not only the widely read and cherished diary, but many of Hannah’s poems and letters, memoirs written by Hannah’s mother, accounts by parachutists who accompanied Hannah on her fateful mission, and insightful material not previously published in English. Described by a fellow parachutist as a “spiritual girl guided almost by mysticism,” Hannah’s life has something of value to teach everyone. Now the subject of a feature-length documentary, Blessed Is the Match: The Life and Death of Hannah Senesh, Hannah’s words and actions will inspire people from each generation to follow their own inner voices, just as she followed hers.

Hannah Senesh, poet and Israel?s national heroine, has come to be seen as a symbol of Jewish heroism. Safe in Palestine during World War II, she volunteered for a mission to help rescue fellow Jews in her native Hungary. She was captured by the Nazis, endured imprisonment and torture, and was finally executed at the age of twenty-three.Like Anne Frank, she kept a diary from the time she was thirteen. This new edition brings together not only the widely read and cherished diary, but many of Hannah?s poems and letters, memoirs written by Hannah?s mother, accounts by parachutists who accompanied Hannah on her fateful mission, and insightful material not previously published in English.Timed to coincide with the release of the first-ever documentary feature on the extraordinary human being behind the diary and writings. Described by a fellow parachutist as ?a spiritual girl guided almost by mysticism,? Hannah?s courage and nobility will inspire a new generation of people to follow their own inner voice just as she followed hers.

Winner of the National Jewish Book Award when it was first published in 1985, In Kindling Flame tells the impassioned story of a young woman who left Europe for Palestine in 1939, when she was just 18, but returned five years later on a parachute mission to rescue other Jews. The mission cost Hannah Senesh her life - she was executed at age 23 by a firing squad in Budapest in 1944. The book presents a moving portrait of a gifted, courageous young woman in a terrible time. In Kindling Flame also presents a gripping history of the Holocaust, Jewish resistance, and the Zionists' effort to create a Jewish national home in British-controlled Palestine.

Presents biographies of famous Jewish men and women who have shown a commitment to upholding Jewish values. Includes activities for performing mitzvot.

An erudite and accessible survey of Jewish life and culture in the twentieth century, as reflected in seminal texts. Following The People and the Books, which "covers more than 2,500 years of highly variegated Jewish cultural expression" (Robert Alter, New York Times Book Review), poet and literary critic Adam Kirsch now turns to the story of modern Jewish literature. From the vast emigration of Jews out of Eastern Europe to the Holocaust to the creation of Israel, the twentieth century transformed Jewish life. The same was true of Jewish writing: the novels, plays, poems, and memoirs of Jewish writers provided intimate access to new worlds of experience. Kirsch surveys four themes that shaped the twentieth century in Jewish literature and culture: Europe, America, Israel, and the endeavor to reimagine Judaism as a modern faith. With discussions of major books by over thirty writers—ranging from Franz Kafka to Philip Roth, Elie Wiesel to Tony Kushner, Hannah Arendt to Judith Plaskow—he argues that literature offers a new way to think about what it means to be Jewish in the modern world. With a wide scope and diverse, original observations, Kirsch draws fascinating parallels between familiar writers and their less familiar counterparts. While everyone knows the diary of Anne Frank, for example, few outside of Israel have read the diary of Hannah Senesh. Kirsch sheds new light on the literature of the Holocaust through the work of Primo Levi, explores the emergence of America as a Jewish home through the stories of Bernard Malamud, and shows how Yehuda Amichai captured the paradoxes of Israeli identity. An insightful and engaging work from "one of America’s finest literary critics" (Wall Street Journal), The Blessing and the Curse brings the Jewish experience vividly to life.

Safe in Palestine during World War II, Hannah Senesh volunteered for a mission to help rescue fellow Jews in her native Hungary. She was captured by the Nazis, endured imprisonment and torture, and was finally executed as a spy at the age of twenty-three.

A biography of the Jewish heroine whose mission to help rescue European Jews in World War II cost her her life.