By Lauren Van Hemert
This Sunday, January 27th, marks the anniversary of the 1945 liberation of Auschwitz and is also International Holocaust Remembrance Day. So it seems fitting that I sat down with Judy Dove, who is directing the upcoming production of I Never Saw Another Butterfly for Forest Moon Theater, and Sheldon Bleiweiss, a Holocaust Educator as well as a child of two Holocaust survivors, to talk about the significance of sharing stories about the Holocaust with young audiences. I Never Saw Another Butterfly is a play inspired by a collection of children’s poems and artwork found buried in a suitcase at Terezin, a concentration camp 30 miles north of Prague in the Czech Republic. I first learned this poem when I was 10-years old in religious school. In fact, it was so impactful that I can still recite this poem by heart 40 years later.
The show opens on February 8th at the Wake Forest Renaissance Centre and is appropriate for all audiences (6th grade and up).
For more information on this production visit: www.forestmoontheater.org.
For more information on the book, I Never Saw Another Butterfly, click here.
For more information on Brundibar and the Music from Terezin, click here.
To learn more about the Holocaust or for resources to share with your children, visit: https://www.ushmm.org/.
For more information on Bleiweiss, visit The Center for Holocaust, Genocide, and Human Rights Education of North Carolina.
