A lost classic of Holocaust literature translated for the first time - from journalist, poet and survivor Jozsef Debreczeni

When Jozsef Debreczeni arrived in Auschwitz in 1944, had he been selected to go 'left', his life expectancy would have been approximately forty-five minutes. One of the 'lucky' ones, he was sent to the 'right', which led to twelve horrifying months of incarceration and slave labour in a series of camps, ending in the 'Cold Crematorium' - the so-called hospital of the forced labour camp Doernhau, where prisoners too weak to work were left to die.

Debreczeni beat the odds and survived. Very soon he committed his experiences to paper in Cold Crematorium, one of the harshest and powerful indictments of Nazism ever written. This haunting memoir, rendered in the precise and unsentimental prose of an accomplished journalist, compels the reader to imagine human beings in circumstances impossible to comprehend intellectually.

First published in Hungarian in 1950 but never translated into English, this important eyewitness account finally takes its place among the great works of Holocaust literature.

'A literary diamond... A holocaust memoir worthy of Primo Levi' The Times

'A masterpiece' New Statesman

About the Author

Jozsef Debreczeni (Author)
Jozsef Debreczeni was a Hungarian-language novelist, poet and journalist who spent most of his life in the former Yugoslavia. He was an editor of the Hungarian daily newspaper UEnnep in Budapest, from which he was dismissed due to anti-Jewish legislation. He was later a contributor to the Hungarian media, including the newspaper Naplo, in the Yugoslav region of Vojvodina, as well as leading Belgrade newspapers. He was awarded the Hid Prize, the highest distinction in Hungarian literature in the former Yugoslavia.

Paul Olchvary (Translator)
Paul Olchvary has translated many books for leading publishers, including Gyoergy Dragoman's The White King, Andras Forgach's No Live Files Remain, Adam Bodor's The Sinistra Zone, Vilmos Kondor's Budapest Noir and Karoly Pap's Azarel. He has received translation awards from the National Endowment for the Arts, PEN America, and Hungary's Milan Fust Foundation. His shorter translations have appeared in the Paris Review, New York Times Magazine, Kenyon Review, Tablet, AGNI and Guernica. He lives in Williamstown, Massachusetts.

Reviews
A literary diamond - sharp-edged and crystal clear. A haunting chronicle of rare, unsettling power... A holocaust memoir worthy of Primo Levi * The Times *
Meticulous and intelligent translation... A masterpiece * New Statesman *
In the timeliest possible way, it succeeds in restoring the Holocaust's reality... Debreczeni writes with a cinematic clarity, a determination to make detail triumph over mass dehumanisation * Telegraph *
Astonishing... Debreczeni captures detail after harrowing detail * Guardian *
As immediate a confrontation of the horrors of the camps as I've ever encountered. It's also a subtle if startling meditation on what it is to attempt to confront those horrors with words... Debreczeni has preserved a panoptic depiction of hell, at once personal, communal and atmospheric * New York Times *



Book Information
ISBN 9781784878887
Author Jozsef Debreczeni
Format Paperback
Page Count 160
Imprint Vintage Classics
Publisher Vintage Publishing
Weight(grams) 200g
Dimensions(mm) 198mm * 129mm * 15mm