The Wren and the Sparrow

Gr 6 Up—A picture book about the Holocaust best appreciated by older readers. Lewis's tale takes place in the Lodz Ghetto in 1944 Warsaw and is based upon the events surrounding the forced surrender of all musical instruments. In "a little hamlet in the center of Poland, hung on the edge of despair….On a day that shamed the sky," soldiers displaying armbands with swastikas force the townspeople to hand over their musical instruments—for many, their most cherished possession—and toss them into wagons. An old carpet weaver—the Wren, known for his beautiful voice—arrives in a velvet horsedrawn coach with his student—the Sparrow—at his side. He begins to play his hurdy-gurdy and sing one last song "…so that no one will ever forget this day." He leads the townspeople in a song of grief and sadness, of protest against the evil Tyrant. The hurdy-gurdy is seized, the old man dragged away, and "the day sealed itself into the lockbox of memory." Only the instrument survives, rescued in darkness by the Sparrow and hidden in a basement, where a young boy eventually finds it, reads the Wren's hidden message, and carries his treasure wherever he travels, passing it on to his great-grandchildren. The grim story has a clear message, and hope is evident in the end. Nayberg's abstract paintings, harboring hints of Modigliani and Chagall, pair well with this story. An author's note on the Lodz Ghetto and music is appended.