Late suicide among Holocaust survivors in Israel: Two life stories- Amia Lieblich

This talk will present the life stories of Chajka Klinger (1917-1958) and Beni Virtzberg (1928-1968), based on two books published recently. Both of these Holocaust survivors have found their way to Israel (or Palestine at that time), have built families and apparently found their place in the new Jewish society, yet some years later developed depression and finally each of them committed suicide at mid-life. Both Klinger and Virtzberg were involved in writing projects, documenting in detail their personal experiences and what they had witnessed during the war. This presentation will point to several possible factors for this tragic life stories, focusing on “survivor’s guilt” on the one hand, and “craving for an audience” on the other hand. It will also raise the question whether narrating traumatic experiences is always beneficial to the narrator’s well being. 

Prof. Amia Lieblich is an Israeli psychologist and writer, emerita of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and currently the president of the Academic College of Society and the Arts. She is among the pioneers of narrative research and the author of numerous books in Hebrew and English. Together with Josselson and McAdams, she was one of the editors of the series Narrative Study of Lives, published in USA. Her most recent book “Death Café 2016” appeared in Hebrew in February 2019.