By Michael R. Mantell
SAN DIEGO — The author, a resident of Golders Green, London, notes in his preface to this remarkably well-illustrated book that people do not ordinarily read graphic novels. Yet, this outstandingly inspiring personal tale, delivered in its exceptionally paradoxical almost cartoon-like hand-drawn genre, is captivating emotionally, and expressively gripping.
Imagine watching a WWII documentary with young children who grew curious about the scenes and accounts they were observing. With natural inquisitiveness, they began asking questions that led the author, Jonathan Sandler, to begin sharing his paternal grandfather’s wartime memories. This prompted further exploration and seizing the opportunity to move from gripping, intimate and momentous memories to the popular graphic novel it has become.
In September 1939, Britain declared war on Germany. The author’s paternal grandfather, Bernard Sandler, at the time was a 17-year-old schoolboy from the City of Leeds, in the County of Yorkshire, on a school trip to Canada. He eventually made it to the United States when it was clearly unsafe to sale home across the Atlantic. As a result of the breakout of war, young Bernard was unable to return home, and remained safe in the United States, separated from his close-knit Jewish family back in Britain.
Bernard wrote in 1940 in his own original memoir, “I did not know if I would ever see my family again. Joseph Kennedy, the US Ambassador to Britain, was reported in the press saying, ‘Democracy is finished in Britain.’ How absurd mankind can be. Each morning the news brought yet another cause for concern.”
What’s changed? Not very much.
Stranded in cosmopolitan New York for an unknown duration, young Bernard was required to grow up quickly. He discovered the pleasures and excitement of Broadway theatre and jazz while developing his own social circle at New York University. Life was to change, as we see in informal illustration after near cartoon-like renderings of a most serious chronicle, how Bernard moved from independence in December 1941, to a member of the United States Army, joining the 26th Infantry, “Yankee” Division.
“On the streets of NY, everyone seemed to be hyperactive. It was like living in a pressure cooker. There was a constant rush to do things by the New Yorkers around me,” we read. He “felt like a very tiny person trying to find my way without getting help from those around me.” Ah, welcome to NY.
Bernard describes that “despite missing and being worried for my family, I had to make the best of things. I was lucky at this time and to have had the opportunity to go to Broadway.”
Life was to change once again.
Eventually, Bernard returned to Europe, serving on the front lines alongside General Patton’s Third Army during the brutal Lorraine Campaign in Northern France in the fall of 1944.
The book also follows the remarkable story of Bernard’s family in England, and the fate of his wider family in Latvia (whom he visited in an epic journey in 1937, also as a schoolboy), during this period.
Ready for a poignant, familiar, stirring, and tender tale in a format that makes it even more absorbing? This is a strong story, magnificently told in drawings and photographs, of the bond of loving, close families, the type to which many will find moving and emotive. The tragedy of war is in the headlines today and this book comes at just the right time.
The San Diego connection cannot go untold here. Jon is the son-in-law of Dr. Sam and Joanne Marcus of La Jolla and Palo Alto, founding members of Adat Yeshurun in La Jolla, and is married to the Marcus’ daughter, Jenny. The pride the family shares in this work is so special, especially since their grandson Theo and twin granddaughters, Amelie “Millie” and Olivia “Lulu” instigated this entire work with their initial questions after watching the WWII documentary with their dad, Jon, and mom, Jenny.
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Michael R. Mantell, Ph.D., prepares a weekly D’var Torah for Young Israel of San Diego, where he and his family are members. They are also active members of Congregation Adat Yeshurun. He may be contacted via michael.mantell@sdjewishworld.com
Fabulous review thank you so much .Mrs Sheila Rinde