The Druggist of Auschwitz

A Documentary Novel

Dieter Schlesak, John Hargraves

• Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
• Year: 2024
• eBook ISBN: 9781429958929
• Topic: Literature
• Subtopic: Literature General
• Index: Literature

Dieter Schlesak's haunting novel The Druggist of Auschwitz—beautifully translated from the German by John Hargraves—is a frighteningly vivid portrayal of the Holocaust as seen through the eyes of criminal and victim alike.
Adam, known as "the last Jew of Schäßburg," recounts with disturbing clarity his imprisonment at the infamous Auschwitz concentration camp. Through Adam's fictional narrative and excerpts of actual testimony from the Frankfurt Auschwitz Trial of 1963–65, we come to learn of the true-life story of Dr. Victor Capesius, who, despite strong friendships with Jews before the war, quickly aided in and profited from their tragedy once the Nazis came to power. Interspersed with historical research and the author's face-to-face interviews with survivors, the novel follows Capesius from his assignment as the "sorter" of new arrivals at Auschwitz—deciding who will go directly to the gas chamber and who will be used for labor—through his life of lavish wealth after the war to his arrest and eventual trial.
Schlesak's seamless incorporation of factual data and testimony—woven into Adam's dreamlike remembrance of a world turned upside down—makes The Druggist of Auschwitz a vital and unique addition to our understanding of the Holocaust.

Table of contents

• Title Page
• Table of Contents
• EDITOR’S NOTE
• THE EYEWITNESS
• THE AUSCHWITZ DISPENSARY
• THE GERMAN OBSESSION WITH RACIAL “PURITY” AND THE GERMAN LANGUAGE AS A CURE
• IT WAS JUST LOVE OF ORDER AND SENSE OF DUTY
• LOVE IN THE DEATH CAMP
• MY GOD, SCIENCE!
• MUSSULMEN, THE UNDEAD OF AUSCHWITZ, AND THE SUSPENSION OF TIME
• THE SONDERKOMMANDO UPRISING
• THE END
• THE MOST SIGNIFICANT FIGURES
• LIST OF MILITARY RANKS DURING WORLD WAR II
• WORKS CONSULTED AND CITED
• Notes
• Copyright Page