Reflections of Prague

When Ivan Margolius was fourteen he learned the truth about his father, Rudolf. He had not died on a trip abroad as Ivan had been told as a young child, but had been executed following a staged show trial. Rudolf, a minister in the Czechoslovak Government and a survivor of Hitler's concentration camps, had sought to create a better world under Communism, but became a victim of the tyranny of Stalin. The story of the Margolius family reflects the history of the city of Prague in the centre of Europe - surviving the First World War to enjoy a brief spell of inter-war democracy, before suffering again under Nazi occupation, the Second World War and the Third Reich extermination of the Jews. After Allied victory came the Communist takeover, Stalinist purges and Soviet occupation before democracy and freedom at the end of the 1980s. The Margolius family lived through the upheaval, suffering and triumphs of the last century's tumultuous times. These were events that Ivan's mother, Heda, was the only one of her family to survive - the rest of her own and her parents' generations were brutally murdered. This family's history is an inspirational and moving account of Europe at a time of turmoil. Yet, despite the anguish, there is hope to be found: acts of human kindness in the midst of suffering and a belief in the sanctity of human spirit, dignity and freedom.