Henkel (Ireland)

Abstract The article discusses the experiences of Yugoslav Jewish women during the Second World War and the Holocaust. It presents little known texts (fictional, paraliterary and documentary works) written by Jewish women (Hilda Dajč, Elvira Kohn, Lea Abinun, Ženi Lebl, and Gina Camhy), one non-Jewish woman (Milojka Mezorana), and one Jewish man (Đorđe Lebović), during or after the Second World War. The main aim of the analysis is to draw attention to the specificity of Jewish women’s narratives in the (post-)Yugoslav cultural space, the contextual framework in which they function, and the risk of their mis- or overinterpretation. The analysis presents also the spectrum of possible readings of texts created during or thematizing the Second World War which are either written by or refer to Jewish women—a group which remained unduly marginalized in the official memory of the Second World War and its aftermath.