Item #205859 Squeezing Through!; Shanghai Sketches, 1941-1945. Refugees, Paula Eskelund, Schiff.

Squeezing Through!; Shanghai Sketches, 1941-1945

(Shanghai): Hwa Kuo Printing Co., n.d. (ca. 1945). First Edition. Oblong 8vo, unpag.; sewn with red cord in printed card wrappers. Small chips to lower corners; small stain on rear wrapper; wrappers evenly toned, though leaving a ghost-image on the rear from a bookend. Despite these flaws, an excellent copy of a delicate publication. Item #205859

An incongruously lighthearted examination from a postwar vantage, illustrated with cartoon drawings, of the life of refugees in Shanghai during the war years. Thousands of European refugees, many of them Jews, had sought safety in Shanghai when war broke out at home. Nominally under Japanese control Shanghai remained a free port city under the treaty that ended the war between China and Japan. When Japan entered the world war, however, the refugees were trapped; the Jews were confined a ghetto for the duration of the war. 'Squeezing through' a precarious existence they thus survived the Holocaust. This is a cheaply produced volume, subject to severe wear, offering a rare glimpse into a lesser-known aspect of the conflict.

Price: $1,500.00