TIME: 12 PM ET | PLATFORM: Zoom | REGISTER: bit.ly/xthedivide
For the public launch of the Ohio Remembers program, storytellers Derek Niemann and Dr. Noemie Lopian from the United Kingdom will share a joint-talk titled, “Speaking Across the Divide,” in honor of International Holocaust Remembrance Day. Dr. Lopian is the daughter of Holocaust survivors and Derek Niemann is the grandson of an SS officer. They will share their family stories as a warning of the perils of extremism and to inspire greater understanding. Derek will focus on the ease with which an ordinary person can descend into the service of a genocidal regime while Noemie will speak to why and how the Holocaust is relevant today and must never be forgotten.
About the Speakers:
Noemie Lopian is the daughter of Holocaust survivors Dr. Ernst Israel Bornstein and Renee Bornstein. Noemie lived in Germany until the age of 13 before moving to Manchester, England. She qualified as a GP and for the last few years has dedicated her time to educating and commemorating the Holocaust, continuing the legacy of her parents.
“Too many young people today are unaware of the atrocities carried out during WWII and I have a passion about educating and restoring humanity in our culture and society.”
She has spent the last 5 years translating her father Ernst’s memoirs into a book called The Long Night.
The Long Night has been featured in the BBC, ITV, Daily Mail and The Express and includes a foreword by Rt Hon David Cameron and Lord Finkelstein.
Derek Niemann is a freelance writer and editor specializing in natural history. In 2012, he interrupted a career writing about bees and butterflies to begin researching and writing a family history story that became A Nazi in the Family (Short Books, 2015), based on the SS grandfather he never knew. His other non-fiction books were Birds in a Cage (Short Books, 2011), telling the story of four Prisoner of War birdwatchers in World War II and A Tale of Trees: The battle to save Britain’s ancient woodland (Short Books, 2016). Derek is a country diary writer for the Guardian with more than 300 columns to his name, is a regular magazine feature writer, and edits a magazine for small woodland owners. Formerly he was children’s magazines editor for the RSPB (1998-2014) and during that time wrote a number of wildlife books for both adults and children.