<p>A survivor of concentration camps and the Death March, Eli Pfefferkorn looks back on his Holocaust and post-Holocaust experiences to compare patterns of human behavior in extremis with those of ordinary life. What he finds is that the concentration camp Müselmann, who has lost his hunger for life and is thus shunned by his fellow inmates on the soup line, bears an eerie resemblance to an office employee who has fallen from grace and whose coworkers avoid spending time with him at the water cooler. Though the circumstances are unfathomably far apart, the human response to their situations is triggered by self-preservation rather than by calculated evil. By juxtaposing these two separate worlds, Pfefferkorn demonstrates that ultimately the human condition has not changed significantly since Cain slew Abel and the Athenians sentenced Socrates.</p>

The Muselmann at the Water Cooler: A Study of Survival in Extreme and Day-to-Day Situations: The Inside View of a Holocaust Survivor (Reference Library of Jewish Intellectual History)

Biographies & Memoirs

Pfefferkorn, Eli

Community & Culture

Academic Studies Press

<p>Winner of the 2012 Helen and Stan Vine Canadian Jewish Book Award in Holocaust Literature. A survivor of concentration camps and the Death March, Eli Pfefferkorn looks back on his Holocaust and post-Holocaust experiences to compare patterns of human behavior in extremis with those of ordinary life. What he finds is that the concentration camp Muselmann, who has lost his hunger for life and is thus shunned by his fellow inmates on the soup line, bears an eerie resemblance to an office employee who has fallen from grace and whose coworkers avoid spending time with him at the water cooler. Though the circumstances are unfathomably far apart, the human response to their situations is triggered by self-preservation rather than by calculated evil. By juxtaposing these two separate worlds, Pfefferkorn demonstrates that ultimately the human condition has not changed significantly since Cain slew Abel and the Athenians sentenced Socrates.</p>

The Müselmann at the Water Cooler (Reference Library of Jewish Intellectual History)

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Books by Pfefferkorn, Eli

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Pfefferkorn, Eli. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

The Muselmann at the Water Cooler: A Study of Survival in Extreme and Day-to-Day Situations: The Inside View of a Holocaust Survivor (Reference Library of Jewish Intellectual History)

The Müselmann at the Water Cooler (Reference Library of Jewish Intellectual History)