Today we bring you a brief biography of Alice Herz-Sommer, a survivor, a woman who defied death and managed to live to an impressive age of 110.
Why is she said she was a survivor? Because she was sentenced to death very young: she was Jewish and taken to a concentration camp, so I was condemned to be an eternal victim.
However, against all odds, she was known as “the most optimistic woman in the world. “
In some of the many interviews she gave, Alice Herz-Sommer claimed that she had a twin sister with which she shared appearance, parents and genes, but whose attitude was radically opposite.
Alice said she was born to be optimistic and that she always tried to see the positive in all circumstances, even in the worst conditions.
“I never talked about the past because I didn’t want my son to grow up with hate, because hate brings more hate. And I did that?. -Alice Herz-Sommer-
This woman was admired for the vitality she maintained until the last years of her life. Despite his advanced age, he practices the piano daily, his great passion.
In addition, she was almost 100 years old when she enrolled in a senior university, her desire to learn and overcome was never abandoned.
Therefore, we want to invite you to discover the keys to this longevity and the optimism with which you have always faced life.
In the history of people with a high level of resilience, there is almost always a happy childhood. Alice Herz-Sommer was born in Prague, now the Czech Republic, on 26 November 1903. He comes from a family of Jewish musicians who excelled. in art and culture.
Alice Herz-Sommer’s house housed the most renowned artists and intellectuals of the time, with Franz Kafka being one of the most diligent. Alice’s sister even married the literary genius’s best friend.
They were also visited by Gustav Mahler, Rainer Maria Rilke, Stefan Zweig and Thomas Mann, and even Sigmund Freud was among the family’s guests.
Alice had had a deep love for music since she was little, since she was eight years old she has devoted he he/she has devoted he he/she with love and discipline to piano and gives concerts in Prague when she was just a teenager.
In 1931, Alice Herz-Sommer met Leopold Sommer, also a musician. He married him and became the great love of his life. In 1937, his only son, Raphael, was born.
In 1939, the Nazi occupation of Checoslovaquia. La most Of the Jews were sent to a ghetto, Alice and her family were environmentally friendly and perhaps that’s why they were allowed to continue living in their apartment.
However, things started to get tough. The Czechs themselves, as the war progressed, began to discriminate against the Jews. In 1942, deportation letters arrived for Alice’s mother and Leopold’s parents. It was a dramatic moment.
Alice herself had to take her 72-year-old mother to the deportation center, where she said goodbye and saw her mother leave to die, that moment of helplessness was for her the most heartbreaking of her life.
Even decades later, Alice continued to remember her mother with nostalgia, melancholy and sadness, especially through Mahler’s melodies.
It wasn’t long before a new eviction order arrived at the family home in 1943, this time for Alice, her husband and son. All three were taken to the Theresienstadt concentration camp, considered an “artists’ camp”.
In theory, those who had been taken there would be preserved, but then it became clear that it was a lie.
In the country, Alice began playing for the Nazis, who planned their exterminations while dining to the sound of concerts offered by this wonderful pianist, but also played for the prisoners.
He said that in total he had made 150 performances, in many of them he could see how music fed the tormented souls of those trapped in the countryside.
Her husband was transferred to the Auschwitz camp and, saying goodbye, said, “Do nothing of your own free will. “
A few days later, the Nazis asked if there was anyone who wanted to join their spouses. Alice remembered Leopold’s words and refused, in this way she managed to save her life.
I used to say the hardest part was watching your son starve to death. To make up for it, she always smiled.
Alice Herz-Sommer and her son were two of the few survivors on the ground. Once the war was over, they moved to Israel. Alice offered not to live in the past and raise her son without hate.
Raphael eventually became a renowned cellist and Alice died at the age of 110 in the English city of London.
Without a doubt, Alice Herz-Sommer’s biography is essential to seeing all that human beings can endure and how our attitude to life can determine our future.