1944 Diary

In 1944, during the German occupation of the Netherlands, Jewish German/Dutch novelist Keilson (Life Goes On) was a budding writer and psychologist living in hiding. He kept a diary through most of 1944, which was only discovered after his death in 2011. The diary is a deeply personal account, made even more remarkable that it was written during World War II and the horrors of the Holocaust. Keilson recounts his complicated personal life; separated from his wife and young daughter, he was having an affair with a younger woman. He also extensively documents his struggle to reconcile his desire to write with his determination to become a doctor. The war is present in occasional comments—rumors of the English arrival in the Netherlands, notes about other Jews in hiding, the sound of distant bombs—especially in one lengthy entry written while he could hear German soldiers outside on the street rounding up Jews and conscripts.