February 8, 2005

Each month in Germany a jury of 30 of the country's leading scholars and media figures (Sachbücher des Monats) vote to decide the country's ten most important non-fiction books.

On the list this month (February)--along with books about Albert Einstein, Leonardo da Vinci, and World War I--is "Für die Tiere ist jeden Tag Treblinka" (ISBN 3861506491), the German edition of "Eternal Treblinka: Our Treatment of Animals and the Holocaust" (New York: Lantern Books, 2002; ISBN 1930051999) by Charles Patterson.

"Für die Tiere ist jeden Tag Treblinka" ("For the Animals Every Day is Treblinka") was published in the fall of 2004 by the German publishing house of Zweitausendeins Versand Dienst GmbH, Frankfurt am Main.

Sachbücher des Monats is sponsored by Südeutsche Zeitung, Buchjournal, Börsenblatt, and Norddeutscher Rundfunk.

Favorable reviews of Patterson's "Für die Tiere ist jeden Tag Treblinka" have also appeared in Germany's two leading newspapers--Süddeutsche Zeitung and Frankfurt Allgemeine Zeitung--as well in Mitteldeutsche Zeitung, Nürnberger Nachrichten, Frankfurter Neue Presse, and other smaller publications.

Since its publication in the United States three years ago by Lantern Books in New York, Eternal Treblinka is fast becoming an international sensation.

Here is how the website of Prijatelji Zivotinja (Animal Friends Croatia) in Zagreb describes Eternal Treblinka: "The book that breaks all taboos. The book that fires up controversies all over the world."

Besides Germany and Croatia, Eternal Treblinka has also been translated and published in Italy, Poland, and the Czech Republic. Other publishers around the world are considering it for publication as well.

The book's title comes from the Yiddish writer and Nobel Laureate, Isaac Bashevis Singer, to whom the book is dedicated. He was the first major modern author to describe the exploitation and slaughter of animals in terms of the Holocaust. "In relation to them, all people are Nazis," he wrote, "for animals it is an eternal Treblinka." (Treblinka was the Nazi death camp north of Warsaw.)

Eternal Treblinka examines the common roots of animal and human oppression and the similarities between how the Nazis treated their victims and how human society treats animals slaughtered for food.

The first part of the book describes the emergence of humans as the "master species" and how it has come to dominate the earth and its other inhabitants. The second part examines the industrialization of slaughter of both animals and humans in modern times, while the last part of the book profiles Jewish and German animal advocates on both sides of the Holocaust, including Isaac Bashevis Singer himself.

Almost immediately after Lantern Books published the book in 2002, it began attracting the attention of foreign publishers, and soon translations were underway.

In April, 2003, the Roman publishing house of Editori Riuniti published the Italian edition (Un'eterna Treblinka), and the following month “Vega!POL” published the Polish edition (Wieczna Treblinka).

In September, 2003, the Publishing House Prah in Prague published the Czech edition (Vecna Treblinka), and in the fall of 2004 Zweitausendeins published the German edition.

Eternal Treblinka has also been translated into Croatian (Vjecna Treblinka) and has just been published by the Genesis publishing house in Zagreb.

In Jerusalem Hebrew translation rights will be available to Israeli publishers at the Jerusalem International Book Fair (Feb. 13-18) at "Chaim Mazo - Publishers Exhibit" (booth #422). The local mobile phone at the booth is 054-7294-565.

Here's What They're Saying-- "Compelling, controversial, iconoclastic...strongly recommended...a unique contribution." --Midwest Book Review

"Eternal Treblinka should be on every list of essential reading for an informed citizenry...for the compelling comprehensiveness of the life-and-death story it tells." --National Jewish Post & Opinion

"A must read! -- how mistreatment of animals leads to the dehumanization and extermination of people as 'mere animals.' Well-written and respectful of both Judaism and the Holocaust." --Rabbi Yonassan Gershom

"There are good books...entertaining, useful, informative; great books...whose message reveals a fundamental truth previously unknown or overlooked; and important books...that can save lives and ameliorate suffering: Eternal Treblinka is all three." --Satya Magazine, New York City.

"The moral challenge posed by Eternal Treblinka turns it into a must for anyone who seeks to delve into the universal lesson of the Holocaust." --Maariv (Israeli newspaper)

"Important and timely...written with great sensitivity and compassion...I hope that Eternal Treblinka will be widely read." --Martyrdom and Resistance (Holocaust publication)

"Every so often a book is written that has the potential to make an incredible difference. Eternal Treblinka is one such book." --N. Glenn Perrett

"Thorough and thought-provoking book" --Ha'aretz (Israeli newspaper)

"It is seldom that such a comprehensive work of scholarship springs from a heart of compassion in the service of a noble and necessary idea. All the ingredients of your thesis--that the oppression of animals serves as the model for all other forms of oppression--have been available to thinking people for generations, but it remained for you to pull them together." --Helen Weaver, author of The Daisy Sutra

"I urge you to read Eternal Treblinka and think deeply about its important message. " --Dr. Jane Goodall

"The whole effect is a very powerful document...No one who reads this book will fail to be moved." --Anglican Society for the Welfare of Animals

"Powerful, moving, gut-wrenching, brilliant--destined to be a classic" --Aviva Cantor, journalist and author

"You must read this carefully documented book" --La Stampa (Italian national newspaper)

"...promises to be one of the most influential books of the 21st century." --Dr. Karen Davis, United Poultry Concerns

"It grips like a thriller." --The Freethinker (UK)

"This book is going to change the world." --Albert Kaplan, Albert Kaplan & Co., Johns Island, SC

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