The Witness Trees: Lithuania - Softcover

"The Witness Trees" tells through poetry, eyewitness accounts, and a moving historical narrative the tangled web of Lithuanian Jewish history. David Wolpe, a powerful Yiddish poet and writer, reports on the events during the summer of 1941 when the Jews of Keidan, a Lithuanian shtetl [village], were systematically massacred by local towns people. He was one of the few survivors when 2,076 men, women, and children perished and he describes in detail how a relatively cooperative and amicable community became a killing field.

Myra Sklarew is a former president of Yaddo Artist Community, professor emerita of literature at American University, and the author of many books of poetry, fiction, and nonfiction. Her awards include the PEN Syndicated Fiction Award, the National Jewish Book Council Award in Poetry, the Anna Davidson Rosenberg Award from the Judah Magnes Museum, a University Scholar/Teacher Award from American University, and others. She has given readings from her work at the Library of Congress, the Folger Shakespeare Library, and elsewhere.