The JFS Sixth Form was recently privileged to host the award winning writer, Bart Van Es to talk about his recent book, ‘The Cut Out Girl’ (winner of the 2018 Costa Biography Award). Bart revealed to a group of Year 12 English Literature and History A Level students, his motives for writing the book and the personal journey that he had gone on in researching his family history and the history of the Jewish girl his family saved, Lien.

The afternoon was an extremely moving one as Bart took the students back in time to Holland during the Second World War and how Lien came to be protected by his grandparents. He also explained the urgency behind writing his account: his growing awareness that such narratives need to be written down as quickly as possible as a generation of survivors passes away, but also his observations that despite the horrors of the Holocaust and the Second World War, Europe may not have fully learnt the lessons of the Twentieth Century.

Finally, thanks must go to Philip Skelker and Stephanie Marcus of the Jewish Book Council, who were so helpful in arranging for Bart van Es to visit JFS.