Lisa Leff’s Archive Thief Stealing the Spotlight

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AU History Professor Lisa Leff’s new book, The Archive Thief: The Man Who Salvaged French Jewish History in the Wake of the Holocaust (Oxford, 2015), is receiving widespread critical and popular acclaim. In it, Leff tells the fascinating and complex story of Zosa Szajkowski (Shy-KOV-ski), a Jewish refugee from Poland—and later France—who alternately collected and stole valuable documents concerning Jewish history from institutions and archives throughout Europe. Leff’s sensitive grasp of the moral and political dilemmas confronting a man like Szajkowski has been enthusiastically profiled in the New York Times, Washington PostJewish Daily Forward, and American Jewish World. (An informative and accessible AU article also explores the main themes of the book.) In addition to print media, Leff has also discussed the writing of her book in online podcasts (Vox Tablet), radio interviews (NPR), and even a popular blog (Wonders and Marvels). She has also “dreamcasted” possible actors who could play Szajkowski in a feature film (spoiler alert: it’s Joaquin Phoenix!).

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Now, in this short video interview, fellow AU History professor Justin Jacobs sits down with Prof. Leff to discuss some of the larger historical issues raised by The Archive Thief. In particular, they talk about those aspects of Szajkowski’s career that evoke similar themes in the history of modern archaeology in China and the Middle East, the subject of Jacobs’s current research.

 

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