Schindler's List

Pfefferberg and his wife, Mila, try to escape the Aktion. Mila wants to wait for Dr. B, who knows a way out of the ghetto, but Pfefferberg wants to leave immediately. Pfefferberg goes out looking for Dr. B, only to find the hospital deserted and the doctor already gone. On the way, he passes a massive pile of bodies, victims of the Aktion. Pfefferberg believes that he saw such things so that he could one day be a witness for the atrocities that happened. Pfefferberg returns home for his wife, only to find her gone; the doctor likely visited her while he was away.

Pfefferberg tries to hide from the SS, which is using dogs to sniff out and brutalize hiding Jewish people. Pfefferberg watches as the SS allows its dogs to savagely maim people. He realizes that he can’t hide from a dog’s sense of smell and comes out of hiding but pretends that an SS officer ordered him to pile up the belongings and suitcases of Jewish people flung into the streets. Goeth and his small personal squad find Pfefferberg sorting the mess, and Goeth demands an explanation. Goeth sees through Pfefferberg’s ruse but is so amused that he lets Pfefferberg join the others who are waiting to be sent to Płaszów.

Wulkan pays off an SS officer, Unkelbach, to hide his family from the Aktion. Unkelbach keeps them holed up in an OD police station until the Aktion dies down and he can safely escort them to Płaszów. While Wulkan and his family wait, Unkelbach returns drenched in the blood of the people he killed. Despondent and distant, he has a strange look in his eye, leading the Wulkan family to believe that he’ll kill them. An OD officer saves them, as the OD are the last out of the ghetto. The OD officer takes them to Płaszów. After Płaszów is cleaned out, more than 4,000 hideaways are found and promptly executed.

Schindler learns from his workers what life is like in Płaszów. Prisoners are routinely executed en masse on an old military entrenchment hill named Prick Hill. The SS don’t attempt to hide their executions or the wheelbarrows of people they haphazardly bury in the woods. Schindler experiences regular difficulties getting his workers to the factory on time because of Płaszów’s politics.

Schindler begins construction of a sub-Płaszów camp in his factory’s backyard to house his workers. He must heavily bribe Goeth and Scherner for this camp. The SS officials treat him as if he has contracted a “virus” from the Jewish people that forces him to sympathize with them. This antisemitic belief allows the Nazis to dismiss anyone who sympathizes with the Jewish people as sick or diseased; they view Schindler as a well-meaning victim of Jewish people. Schindler spends well over $300,000 US on the construction of the camp at his factory. Adam Garde, an engineer prisoner of Płaszów, is recruited to lead the camp’s construction. Once in Płaszów, Spira loses all authority, and the OD is disbanded. The most influential prisoner is Chilowicz, a man who does black-market dealings for Goeth. Chilowicz’s usefulness to Goeth makes him a minor aristocrat in the prison.

Word begins to spread about Schindler’s subcamp. Prisoners try to find a way to work in DEF to escape Płaszów proper. Among them are Horowitz and his family. Horowitz gets his family employed at DEF through Bosch. Schindler’s camp operates in a vastly different way than Płaszów. In Schindler’s camp, the SS are forbidden from entering the Jewish quarters, harassing the prisoners is strictly forbidden, and prisoners get more than twice as much food as Płaszów prisoners.

Prisoners have difficulty processing the existence of DEF amid the Nazi terror. A prisoner named Regina Perlman begs Schindler to employ her family at DEF. Schindler publicly ridicules her and refuses to employ her, yet her parents are hired at DEF shortly thereafter.

Goeth continues his reign of terror on Płaszów. He executes workers in broad daylight for the slightest infraction and makes no exception for children. He particularly dislikes an orthodox Rabbi named Levartov because other prisoners respect him. Goeth tries to execute Levartov, but his gun misfires. He tries a second gun, which also misfires. Humiliated, Goeth lets him live. The prisoners believe that Goeth will execute Levartov given another chance, so they have him moved to DEF subcamp in the summer of 1943. There, Schindler slips him illegal wine to perform Sabbath rites for prisoners on the weekends.

By the summer of 1943, Schindler’s costs for upkeep at DEF and briberies skyrocket. Schindler spends extra to make sure his workers have an adequate diet, and the lack of hunger at DEF becomes “dangerously visible.” When Goeth visits DEF’s subcamp to inspect it, he tries to execute a DEF worker named Lamus in the same casual way he executes Płaszów prisoners. Schindler saves Lamus by bribing the SS with vodka when Goeth turns his back.

Executions at Płaszów become an everyday occurrence. Keneally recounts the executions of Krautwirt, a DEF worker, and Haubenstock, a teen boy. The Germans hanged Krautwirt in Płaszów to remind people that DEF was still its subcamp. Many survivors remember Krautwirt’s execution and how they believed that Płaszów wouldn’t get worse than hangings and occasional firing squads.

Schindler arranges for Sedlacek and another accomplice, Babar, to tour Płaszów. Stern shows them around while Sedlacek takes pictures with an illegal, hidden camera. This reveals Płaszów as a sham of an operation that exists to enrich Goeth and his underlings. Schindler and Madritsch’s efforts to keep their workers safe keeps Płaszów afloat through the war contracts they bring in. The work of the prisoners, paradoxically, puts Goeth in a position to torment and execute them at will while keeping them from the execution chambers of Auschwitz.

People close to Schindler believe that he’s spending like a “compulsive gambler.” He spends huge sums of money to save individual people, such as Herlene Schindler (no relation to him), whom he rescues from Montelupich. Meanwhile, Schindler struggles to find people willing and able to take the money that the Budapest Zionist organization sends. Bankier, Schindler’s floor manager at DEF, helps him find people to take the money.

Keneally uses statistics to convey Schindler’s commitment to his people. In 1943, DEF fabricates more than 30,000 kg of enamelware exclusively for bribery and black-market dealings. Schindler spends much of his own money to buy black-market gynecological equipment for a DEF woman who becomes pregnant. Schindler must even buy a used car from an SS officer, despite not needing it in the least, to stay in the officer’s good graces. Despite the massive personal costs, Schindler never uses Zionist money for himself; he always gives every cent away.

Raimund Titsch, Madritsch’s floor manager, spends his time in Płaszów overseeing the Madritsch factory. He often plays chess against Goeth, who rages when he loses. Titsch drags his matches out with Goeth for hours and always lets himself lose. Keeping Goeth preoccupied and letting him win means that the prisoners are safe from his wrath whenever Titsch plays chess with him. Titsch uses his time in Płaszów to take dozens of photographs. However, he doesn’t develop the film; he instead buries it in Vienna to hide it from a postwar Nazi organization named ODESSA. After the war, Pfefferberg purchases the location of this box of photographs from Titsch and develops the film.

In late 1943, General Schindler (no relation to Oskar Schindler) comes to inspect the Płaszów labor camp. The near-mythical account from survivors claims that Schindler got the general and his men severely drunk for the inspection and that saboteur prisoners cut power to the camp, so the drunk men had to inspect the facilities with flashlights. Survivors claim that these two factors enabled Płaszów to continue operating despite its inadequacy in churning out material goods.

Rebecca Tannenbaum and Josef Bau are two Płaszów survivors who met in Płaszów. Tannenbaum is Goeth’s personal manicurist and navigates the highly volatile environment of working in Goeth’s home. Bau worked under Stern as an accountant and architect.

In January 1944, Płaszów is converted from a labor camp to a concentration camp. This puts the camp directly under the jurisdiction of Oranienburg SS bureaucrats and severely hampers Goeth’s control over the camp. He can no longer execute people as he pleases and instead must write to Oranienburg with official reasons and a request to execute a prisoner.

The new status as a concentration camp means that the men and women are separated behind rows of barbed wire. Josef secures a dead woman’s dress and uses it to visit Rebecca at night. The two marry in Rebecca’s bunkhouse in February and have as traditional a Jewish wedding as possible under the circumstances. Sirens interrupt the wedding, and Josef believes that he’s being hunted for deserting his assigned bunk in the men’s prison. He narrowly slips back into the men’s prison only to find that the SS was looking for different escapees.

Schindler turns 36 in April 1944. His mental health worsens under the strain of being a double-agent within the SS ranks. He wants the Russians to advance into German territory and end the war—and he wants to extract Henry Rosner from Płaszów, but Rosner refuses because his status as a musician protects him. He tells Schindler how Pfefferberg helped him smuggle his son, Olek, into Płaszów. Schindler reacts violently, nearly smashing the portrait of Hitler in his office.

The SS are losing ground at this point in the war and begin planning to destroy their concentration camps if the Russians advance far enough. Destroying Płaszów means digging up and cremating the hundreds of bodies buried haphazardly around the camp with little to no documentation. The cremation at Płaszów is so severe that it fills the air with human ash and coats the entire camp. Among those cremated are Symche Spira, his family, and the OD: They were all executed once they liquidated the ghetto for the SS and were no longer useful. Schindler is present in Płaszów when the cremation happens. The thick coat of human ash rattles him, and he vows to save everyone from Płaszów.

In the summer of 1944, Mietek Pemper works in Goeth’s office as a typist. Pemper is an excellent typist and has perfectly recalls everything he has ever read. Pemper uses his talents to work on confidential documents for Goeth and commits each one to memory. Pemper hopes to use his memory to indict Goeth when the war ends. Pemper’s position, however, makes him more likely to be executed by Goeth for everything he knows.

That summer, the “health action” occurs. It results in 10,000 prisoners’ being liquidated and sent to places like Auschwitz for certain death. Goeth wants to make room for healthier, more able-bodied prisoners who can work harder and thus earn him more money and prestige in the Nazi party. SS Dr. Blancke conducts the health action, which involves assessing each prisoner for physical endurance through a naked sprinting competition. Many families hide their children during the health action because children are being sent off to make room for able-bodied adult workers.

The advance of the Soviets makes Goeth paranoid, and he calls for a “security conference” with Bosch, Madritsch, and Schindler. Goeth believes that the Russian advance will incite insurgents in the camp—and that these three men are his allies against an insurrection. After the conference, Schindler goes on a ride with Goeth. Along the way, Schindler spots the cattle cars full of people liquidated from the health action. The railways are jam-packed with cars as the SS scrambles to deal with the Russian advance, so the prisoners can’t be sent off yet and bake in the summer heat inside the locked cattle cars. Schindler rushes into action and brazenly bribes the SS—right in front of Goeth—to hose down the cattle cars in order to cool the people off. Schindler ensures that the people get water to drink too. Goeth finds Schindler’s behavior humorous and pitiable; Goeth knows that Schindler can’t save them and thus lets him do as he pleases.

Schindler’s disposition changes after the cremations and health action. He wants to actively sabotage the German war effort now. Schindler sits up all night listening to the radio with his engineer, Adam Garde, after an assassination attempt on Hitler. Schindler hopes that the assassination attempt was successful. In the early morning hours of the morning, Hitler speaks on the radio broadcast, and Schindler becomes severely demoralized.

Goeth becomes worried about Płaszów being closed. Increasingly paranoid, Goeth sees enemies all around him. He believes that Chilowicz might sink him because of his black-market dealings on Goeth’s behalf. Goeth documents a fake escape attempt for Chilowicz and his family, allowing him to summarily execute the entire Chilowicz family under the guise of stopping an insurrection. Goeth accuses the typist, Pemper, of being part of the plot and has him create a list of names that are supposedly part of the conspiracy, demanding that he leave a blank space at the bottom of the page. Pemper does so, thinking the blank space is for his own name and that Goeth has finally decided to execute him. Instead, the blank space is for a man who was hoarding diamonds outside of Płaszów.