Joseph Toltz and Anna Boucher will be in conversation with Kim Rubenstein on their new book Out of the depths. The first collection of Holocaust songs.Available for the first time in English translation, this collection of songs is a powerful memorial to the victims of the Holocaust.

In June 1945, before the full devastation of the Holocaust had emerged, a team of researchers embarked on a remarkable project. While documenting the experiences of Jewish refugees, they began to collect songs composed and sung in the Nazi camps and ghettos. The resulting book, Mima'amakim (Out of the depths), was published in a short run of 500 copies. Today, only a handful survive.

Out of the depths presents the contents of this extraordinary document for a new generation of readers. Based on a copy of Mima'amakim discovered in 2013, it contains not only the songs' melodies and lyrics, the latter in a new translation by Joseph Toltz, but also short biographies of the composers, drawn from painstaking original research. Introductory essays provide historical and musicological background, deepening our knowledge of this terrible event and the creative means by which the Jewish people responded to and endured it.

“This project took us across countries and generations - speaking with survivors, families and communities - to piece together a detective story of sorts that spans continents and decades. Anna Boucher. “Some of these songs were almost lost to history and now they can be heard again.” Joseph Toltz

'Readers who know little of the Holocaust will be jolted into empathy. Yiddishists will find these songs a valuable addition to the growing body of personal writing in a language newly studied in the 21st century. One contributor to the book thought of the work as a "tombstone" to the dead. Instead, we should consider it a libretto to keep hope alive.' Kirkus Reviews

Dr Joseph Toltz is an ethnomusicologst and research manager at the University of Sydney and a former fellow at the Mandel Center for Advanced Holocaust Studies at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. An expert on Jewish music and its migrations to Anglophone countries, his work incorporates creative research (performance, composition, and arrangement), Jewish studies, Holocaust studies, and History.

Dr Anna Boucher is an Associate Professor in Political Science and Public Policy at the University of Sydney. An expert on migration and a solicitor, her work sits at the intersection of politics, law, migration studies and research methods. Her three previous books cover skilled immigration, gender diversity and workplace exploitation. Anna is a regular commentator in the media and consultant to domestic and global governments on migration issues.

Professor Kim Rubenstein, FAAL FASSA, is an Australian legal scholar and legal practitioner. From 2006 to 2016 she was Professor and Director of the Centre for International Law and Public Law at the Australian National University and from 2020-2022 she was Co-Director, Academic of the 50/50 by 2030 Foundation. She is currently an Adjunct Professor at the University of Canberra and the University of Technology Sydney and an Honorary Professor at The Australian National University.

Books will be available for signing from 5.30pm and again after the event.

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