Your Name is Renee

BOOK

Your Name Is Renee:

Ruth Kapp Hartz's Story As a Hidden Child in Nazi-Occupied France

Cretzmeyer, Stacy and Beate Klarsfeld. Your Name Is Renee: Ruth Kapp Hartz's Story As a Hidden Child in Nazi-Occupied France. New York: Oxford University Press, 2002. 209 pages. ISBN: 0195154991.

REVIEW

The biography of Ruth Kapp Hartz is a gripping story for readers of all ages. Stacy Cretzmeyer, Ruth Hartz’s former French student in the Philadelphia schools, has written an informative and important work of fine literature that will bring this chapter of the Holocaust to readers interested in suspense, action, intrigue, and happy endings. Whether used by junior high students in pursuit of “chapter book” points for outside reading or as a supplement to a secondary or post-secondary curriculum, Cretzmeyer’s account (told in Mrs. Hartz’s first-person perspective) will please any reader. Certainly while not all books in this genre of survivor literature or hidden children end on a positive note, Cretzmeyer has given us a ray of sunshine amidst the darkness that was the Shoah.

From the author’s preface:

In school, as my French teacher, Ruth had never spoken about her experiences as a young Jewish child in Nazi-occupied France. I did not know that she was Jewish, nor that her parents were originally from Germany. At that time, I knew only that she had grown up in Paris, and she had expressed great interest in my writing career. We corresponded, and when I finally decided to go to France to do research for a book about the fate of Jewish children in Nazi-occupied France, I wrote to Ruth and asked her for recommendations of people I might interview and where I might find resources for my research.

Amazingly, Ruth wrote back and confided to me that she, herself, had been a hidden child, and had survived that war due to a network of Resistance fighters who had sheltered her – and her parents – in a village in southern France. Ruth invited me back to Philadelphia to talk about this subject, and as I had plans to return to the area, we met one Sunday morning for brunch.

The first questions Ruth asked me were: “Why do you want to write about this subject? Why is it important to you?” It was my turn to confide in Ruth that, as a fifth-grader, I had heard the personal account of a Catholic woman who had sheltered Jewish families during the early years of the war. She and her husband had smuggled many families to “safe houses,” and eventually attracted the attention of Gestapo agents. The woman had been tortured by the Nazis in an effort to force her to disclose the whereabouts of her husband. Her fingernails were torn out, one by one, by her Nazi persecutors, but the woman never confessed. Unfortunately, her husband was eventually captured and murdered by the Nazis. The woman, left a widow, made her way to Paris, where she was taken in by a Catholic religious order. Eventually, she became a nun and lived and worked in the convent. She was transferred to the United States in the sixties and was a staff member at my school in Philadelphia. That was how I came to hear her story (xiv-xv).

This book can be effectively used in classrooms ranging from 5^th grade through post-secondary. Easily accessible with a minimal requirement for vocabulary research (more so a concern for early adolescents) , the concepts contained within should make for reading that begets important discussions. This text can be used to get students to think about the opportunity costs and opportunity benefits different individuals had to weigh when making the decision(s) to pursue a particular course of action. Chance and premeditated action insofar as rescue was concerned can be contrasted, and the roles of fate and luck can also be brought into the discussion. Altruism is a major theme that should be brought out as a moral issue – why are some who have the means to assist guided by altruistic tendencies, while others who may even be in a position to be more helpful make the decision to remain idle? In the Afterword, Ruth Kapp Hartz writes, in regard to the “punch in the face” she and her family received when traveling north to Paris after the war:

How to account for the different treatment we received from the people of southern France with whom we came in contact? Why were so many of them willing to endanger their own lives to work for the Resistance and shelter Jewish families? Many of the Jews who survived the occupation of France owe their lives to these stalwart country folk who literally did not know the meaning of the words “Jews” and “anti-Semitism”. “Qu’est-ce que c’est au juste un juif?” they often asked Papa. “What is a Jew, really?” (198).

Here the teacher might also tie in a quote from Dante –

The hottest places in Hell are reserved for those, who in times of great moral crisis, choose neutrality.

Cretzmeyer has divided her narrative into three major parts, each with several chapters. The first part is entitled Escape, followed by In Hiding, and the book concludes with a shorter section called Liberation. We follow Ruth and her family through their life in France as the war intensifies and as the collaborative Vichy Regime is established (students may need some explanation as to why WWI hero Henri Petain is not greeted so warmly as he pays a visit to Ruth’s village), the French collaborators at the local level begin to clamp down and eventually threaten the Jewish population, and as the family seeks refuge among Gentile friends. Eventually Ruth is given away to a Catholic orphanage where she is made to act as an orphan and as a non-Jew. Students may be interested to discuss the ramifications of these events as they might play out in the mind of an impressionable 5-6 year old child. As the last part of the book implies, the family is eventually reunited, and the details of how they were affected by the events of the end of the war are told. A powerful quote by Ruth near the end of the book serves as a great summation for the trauma on a child’s life as wreaked by the Nazis:

Papa told me that we were safe now, but I wasn’t even sure what that meant, or how to behave. I could not remember a time in my life when we were not hiding (184).

Your Name is Renee is a book that is easily excerpted for classroom use. Whether read aloud or with students focused on short passages, this book can serve as a great avenue toward covering such Holocaust issues as collaborators, hiding, rescue, and the overlying issue of children caught in the middle of it all.

PASSAGE/QUOTE FOR CLASSROOM USAGE

A good microcosm of the book is contained in a passage found on pages 90-91 in the chapter titled “In the Valats’ Cellar”. In this portion of the text, Ruth Kapp Hartz relates a time when stress was building on the Kapp family as they were being sheltered by a French family. The Nazis were putting demands on their French collaborators, which was in turn putting pressure on those who wanted to save their own necks. The Jews were obviously caught in the middle. See below for an assignment relating to this passage.

RATIONALE FOR USAGE/UNIT RELEVANCE

As there were approximately 1 ½ million Jews under the age of 18 who perished during the Holocaust, all teachers should (time permitting, of course) present to their students a unit on Children in the Holocaust, or at least a lesson or two on hidden children. Of course, many junior or senior high school students have read The Diary of a Young Girl by Anne Frank; while that book is a modern classic and some have said that Anne Frank has become an American icon, it tends to leave an overly optimistic impression. Not all Dutch Jewish families were aided, and certainly Anne was not able to record the details of the last months of her life. While we know she passed away mere weeks before Bergen-Belsen was liberated by the British, we do not have the same first-person account of her last days that we have of her time spent in hiding. A book such as Your Name is Renee allows us to see a different view of Jews in hiding – one of a family on the move, of the deception against the Nazis they had to carry out, and of the life and death decisions that had to be made – sometimes on a moment’s notice.

CLASSROOM METHOD OF USAGE

I would allow students to individually read a short passage from this book, and then move into cooperative learning groups to answer some questions. After a fair amount of time to complete the work, I would suggest coming back together as a big group for discussion. You might elect to keep the students in groups, with each having selected a spokesperson to explain their ideas to the rest of the class.

STUDY QUESTIONS/DISCUSSION GUIDE

Please read individually the following passage from the book Your Name Is Renee: Ruth Kapp Hartz's Story As a Hidden Child in Nazi-Occupied France. After a few minutes, you will be assigned a small group to go over some study questions. The class will reconvene after that for discussion of this material.

As the weeks wore on, Maman (Ruth’s name for her mother) and Papa were worried by the ever-increasing number of roundups occurring in Albi. We often had to run into the fields and hide for several hours, having heard reports of roundups in the neighboring towns. Sometimes we met other Jews there who had come from Albi; they had been fortunate enough to escape their places of hiding before the French police came for them.

During this time, rumors began to circulate that the French police were redoubling their efforts to track down the Jews still in hiding in the small villages. The police had to fill their quotas in order to placate the Nazis, who had strict timetables and refused to send trains to the east unless they were filled to capacity. We did not know whether to believe the rumors or not, but Maman grew more and more hesitant about leaving the apartment. The Protestant minister who had taken Papa to Toulouse in August got in touch with Papa through an intermediary. This messenger warned Papa that things were getting worse, not better—particularly for the foreign and “stateless” Jews, very few of whom, he was told, were left in France.

The rumors my parents heard were true, and Papa was urged to stop working at the Sauts du Tarn factory altogether, and to stay inside at all times.

“If we do that,” Papa cried, “we will have no money to pay off the town crier!”

The minister’s friend told Papa that he would try to arrange something. He urged Papa to continue following all of Monsieur Fedou’s instructions. “If you hear there is going to be a roundup, or if you see anything suspicious yourself, get out of here. Go into the fields, climb into the hills, just get out. The first place they will look for you, Monsieur Caper (the French name the Kapps used), is here, in your own apartment, or at the factory.”

“I understand,” Papa said, “you don’t have to tell me!” (90-91).

Questions for your group to consider:

1. How do you suppose it was that the Kapps received “reports” from neighboring towns?

a. Do you think these reports were always accurate or trustworthy?

b. Do you think the Kapps reacted every time they heard such reports?

c. How would you decide if you should do something – whether or not action was really required or you were just hearing rumors?

2. Describe the conditions one might encounter when hiding in a field.

a. How would the family know when it was safe to return?

b. What steps would the family have to take on the return to ensure that the field remained a place they could hide again later?

3. Discuss the various roles of the French people described in this passage.

a. Why would some people collaborate with the Nazis?

b. Why would some people not collaborate with the Nazis?

4. What do you think is going on in this part of the reading: The police had to fill their quotas in order to placate the Nazis, who had strict timetables and refused to send trains to the east unless they were filled to capacity.?

a. Whose were the quotas?

b. What does “refused to send trains to the east” mean? Were the Nazis doing the French people a favor?

c. Who would be punished (and give examples of how you think the punishments would be carried out) if the timetables were not followed?

5. Is it significant that the minister mentioned was a Protestant and not a Catholic? Would a Catholic clergyman have had more trouble assisting the Jews?

6. React to the following excerpt: Papa was urged to stop working at the Sauts du Tarn factory altogether, and to stay inside at all times. “If we do that,” Papa cried, “we will have no money to pay off the town crier!”

a. In movies and literature, the town crier was the person who went around saying “Two o’clock, and all’s well!” What else might be the job of a town crier?

b. Why would the town crier have to be bribed?

7. Count the number of people in this passage who are risking their lives, and state how for each one. What decisions does each person have to make on a daily basis?

8. Construct an “if-then” tree for this reading, showing all of the people Papa encountered and give a possible alternative outcome for each relationship. See the example to help you get started.