Pulitzer Prize Biography Winner

Days of Sorrow and Pain: Leo Baeck and the Berlin Jews

by Leonard Baker

Summary

Leonard Baker tells the story of Rabbi Leo Baeck, the spiritual leader who chose to remain with the Jewish community of Berlin as the Nazis tightened their grip. The book follows Baeck through deportation to the Theresienstadt concentration camp, where he sustained faith and dignity amid the Holocaust. It is both a personal portrait and an account of a community facing destruction.

Historical Context & Significance

Leo Baeck survived the Theresienstadt camp and later lent his name to the Leo Baeck Institute, which preserves the history of German speaking Jewry.