“The Drowned and the Saved” is the last book from Holocaust survior and writer Primo Levi, published shortly before his suicide in 1987. In this book, he attempted to address the questions “why atrocities happened” and “how to prevent them from happening again”. In different chapters, he distilled his experiences in the camp to explore the fluidity (he termed it “the grey zone”) in human characters, the fragility of perceived memory as well as the state of mind of those in the camps.
on comprehension
Not long after he was transported to Auschwitz, Levi derived his 1st motto of survival there: “don’t try to understand”. He stated that in a mad world, you would sink into desperation like quicksand if you maintain your original mindset grounded in morality and rationality. To comprehend often leads to simplify. Simplification, however, is an assumption only, we must keep in mind that it’s not the reality.
Intellectuals just wasted too much time pondering the “why” in an illogical and immoral world. On the other hand, he thought that intellectuals did benefit from their confidence in history that things always repeated but remained transient.
on certainty
Equally important is to accept the universal truth, that the most certain thing in the world is that there is no certainty in anything. He observed that people were so addicted to certainty that suffering irresistible assaults from the Nazi was better than those from supposedly compatriots in the camp, something that was unexpected and deeply humiliating.
One of the big lessons he learnt as a newcomer in the camp was that human networks couldn’t be simplified into a binary world. Everyone entering the camp expected it to be a horrible but comprehendable world: a “we (Jews) vs them (Nazi)” place. But to his horror, it was a world unable to fit into any model. In addition to the expected cruelty from the Nazi guards, he also witnessed ruthless behaviors from fellow camp residents (the supposedly allies). This mental shock taught him that the enemy was indeed in everyone, and everything was fluid and ambiguous.
People always want certainty, even during extremely chaotic times. They want to classify others as either belonging to our clan or the enemy. According to many psychology books, our brains are built this way to conserve energy and increase our survival rate. But it’s precisely during volatile times that those scramble for survival are more inclined to do anything at the end of the moral spectrum to increase their chances, thus making their identity more ambiguous. This is the “grey zone” that Levi revisited multiple times in the book. Human behaviors are situational and span widely across the spectrum, and the “grey zone” that people slide on is much bigger than both the pure white and black sections.
Thus Levi proclaimed that it’s unrealistic to predict what we would do under extreme circumstances. The German saying that “those that shouldn’t happen won’t happen” just blinds people from seeing signs of impeding threats.
on memory
As time elapses from an event, the gap between reality and imagination widens. Memories are borne to be unreliable. Extreme experiences are even more prone to distort their associated memory.
Levi also addressed why most Nazi officials as well as some citizens who did their shares in the Holocaust didn’t remember their roles. When we make a mistake, we often cannot deny that ourselves, but we can definitely fabricate our intention behind it to make us look more innocent. The more you tell the story to yourself and others around you, the more you’re completely absorbed into the story you’re acting in and you begin to truly believe in it.
on suicide
One question Levi pondered was why there were few suicides in the camp amid grave sufferings. His view was that the coerced loss of self identity, moral character and culture reduced victims to animals. Animals don’t commit suicide, only humans who can think will kill themselves. Suicide is a rational not an intuitive choice, so it only happens in human. In addition, when death hangs above you in every second of your life, you won’t think about suicide.
To reemerge into reality, to finally face the aftermath of the atrocity, to be a human again and pick up the ability to feel, drove these survivors to suicide post-war. Unfortunately, Levi became one of them shortly after the publication of this book. It is often said that he died in Auschwitz 4 decades later.
summary
Although this is a very heavy subject, I learnt a lot from his reflection on atrocity via different psychological angles. Again and again, he illustrated that things are not simply binary but built up by multiple factors that could move and morph simultaneously. On closing, it was hard to not lose hope in humanity. However, to understand and accept reality as it is, allows us to be more open and adaptive to the changing world. It also forces us to be more honest with ourselves and the possibility that we could also be pushed into the grey zone in extreme times, as Levi said. This reminds me of the following note from the Cambodian genocide display in Seattle’s Wing Luke Museum. The point here isn’t to compare Khmer Rouge with the Nazi as the latter’s so-called Final Solution was indeed planned from the start to decimate a group of people. I’m rather drawing a parallel with Levi’s assertion that even ordinary citizens who didn’t initially possess a desire to harm, might gradually slide into the grey zone given the right context. To accept this possibility and to always be viligant, become our responsibility as humans.
