Everand Logo

Welcome to Everand!

  • Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

    Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

    The Bribe
    The Bribe
    The Bribe
    Ebook237 pages4 hours

    The Bribe

    By Oskar Klausenstock

    ()

    Read preview

    About this ebook

    As Nathan Klein recovers from a stroke in a rehabilitation hospital, he finds that he recognizes a fellow patientGerhard Reichenberg, a former Nazi who served as commandant in Kleins Kostowa ghetto in Poland during World War II. Klein, then seventeen years old, hasnt seen Reichenberg, known as the Dog Catcher, in almost fifty years. Back then, Reichenberg was a man to fear.

    Deeply agitated, Klein writes letters to Reichenberg expressing his still simmering hate for the man. Reichenberg, who has been a diabetic most of his life, replies in writing as well. Each tells of his own tragedies: Klein of his suffering and the loss of his entire family. Reichenberg of the loss of Esta, a young Jewish maiden assigned to him by the Jewish Ghetto Elders by way of a bribe in hopes to save their lives. Gerhard, gone from the ghetto for a few days, returns to find the entire village annihilated and no trace of Esta, who was pregnant.

    Ulrica Egberg, the centers physical therapist, fond of both Klein and Reichenberg, tries to make peace between these two elderly men. The letters, bitter at first, become more tolerant and understanding of each other as they face the truth of their lives and their histories.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisheriUniverse
    Release dateSep 23, 2013
    ISBN9781491709160
    The Bribe
    Author

    Oskar Klausenstock

    Oskar Klausenstock was born and raised in Poland, where he spent time in several concentration camps during World War II. He arrived in the United States in 1949 and attended Boston University. He has published poetry and research papers and is now a retired physician. He lives with his family in California.

    Related to The Bribe

    Related ebooks

    Historical Fiction For You

    View More
    View More

    Related podcast episodes

    Related articles

    • Article

      Five Poems

      Jul 1, 2022

      You have to go back to being immature,a timed regression essentialto running up a further lifetime of debt. I owe you, the polar bear says,an icy French OUI. A kiss on both cheeks,plus a wish to sit on a bench at the center of a green-painted park,yo

      3 min read

    • Article

      Equinox

      May 18, 2022

      In this strange world, where identities change with the rising and setting of the sun, supernatural forces are at work – and they’re causing trouble… St Leonars prison was an appropriately imposing building. It rose out of the surrounding shacks and

      5 min read

    • Article

      Estella’s Fate

      May 17, 2023

      Estella’s Fate
      7 min read

    • Article

      Estella’s Fate

      May 17, 2023

      Estella’s Fate
      7 min read

    • Article

      Dark Tales

      Dec 2, 2021

      Dark Tales
      6 min read

    • Article

      Notes From A Nothing

      Feb 14, 2020

      Notes From A Nothing
      13 min read

    • Article

      Six Poems

      Nov 1, 2023

      loved best. Words I have neversaid. New sentence, at 80. Of coursenot more than his children, and their children. That goeswithout saying—but I want to lay down eachelement of love’s house. First,the hole, under—apple cellar, potato cellar,cellar to

      5 min read

    • Article

      Where Night Stops

      Jan 15, 2018

      Where Night Stops
      6 min read

    • Article

      Four Poems

      Mar 1, 2024

      I was trying to look a little less like myselfand more like other humans, humans who belonged, so I put on a skort.Purchased in another life, when I had a husband and wrote thank-you notes and held dinner parties,the skort even had its own little poc

      6 min read

    • Article

      Speedboat

      Mar 24, 2022

      Nobody died that year. Nobody prospered. There were no births or marriages. Seventeen reverent satires were written – disrupting a cliché and, presumably, creating a genre. That was a dream, of course, but many of the most important things, I fi nd,

      14 min read

    • Article

      Two Poems by Phillip B. Williams

      Dec 15, 2017

      The masters are yet dead. Wanting to be human,I tried to rewrite The Waste Land. The canon’s reachcasts ruinous light. The masters’ pens breachthis page where, above, my own hand spectates. Babylonrisen, exorcism in reverse, whose nature upended now?

      6 min read

    • Article

      Mrs Macarthur’s Secret Diary

      Jun 17, 2020

      Mrs Macarthur’s Secret Diary
      7 min read

    • Article

      Mothers As Makers Of Death

      Aug 14, 2018

      Mothers As Makers Of Death
      8 min read

    • Article

      Mrs Macarthur’s Secret Diary

      Jun 17, 2020

      Mrs Macarthur’s Secret Diary
      7 min read

    • Article

      Five Poems

      Jan 1, 2023

      I wanted something in my heart like a drum.Peaches fell from trees.Suddenly: monsoon season.So, I told myself a storyto soothe myself into a kind of slumbernot like the wrestling recently begunnot like the wager life seems hell-benton becoming. Meanw

      2 min read

    • Article

      The Broken Mirror

      Sep 2, 2022

      GONE WERE THE CAMPERS and the counselors. Gone were the Civilian Conservation Corps cabins. Gone were the horses and the corral, the mess hall and the bathhouse. Tall grass and brambles grew in the field between the mountain and the river. Only the m

      3 min read

    • Article

      It’s Come to This

      Sep 1, 2021

      It’s Come to This
      16 min read

    • Article

      Collins Ferry Landing

      Jul 1, 2020

      for my father Only rivers bottom out like this.Only rivers bottom out with this kind of conviction.Not humans, or, at least, not humans asindisputably human as you were,trapped in consciousness’s surplus, exilic,animalized absurdity, writhing in its

      5 min read

    • Article

      What My Stroke Taught Me

      Apr 6, 2017

      In my memories of the Scottish hospital, the sky is always blue, though I know that can’t be completely accurate. Summer was waning, and as my friends and I had already experienced, Edinburgh was prone to unpredictable storms. Yet, I can’t think of a

      16 min read

    • Article

      ‘The Divines’: Featured Fiction from Ellie Eaton

      Jan 19, 2021

      An excerpt from a debut novel Booklist calls "sharp and haunting." The post ‘The Divines’: Featured Fiction from Ellie Eaton appeared first on The Millions.

      13 min read

    • Article

      Jason the Heat Guy

      Jan 11, 2021

      Jason the Heat Guy
      11 min read

    • Article

      A Hot, Dusty Track

      Jul 12, 2023

      A Hot, Dusty Track
      4 min read

    • Article

      The Thin Place

      Nov 16, 2020

      We looked out of the window at the torrential rain. We’d booked tickets for the Castle’s Halloween event. The Castle was famous for being haunted by the ghost of its last court jester and made the most of this reputation every October, hosting a fair

      6 min read

    Related categories

    Reviews for The Bribe

    0 ratings

    0 ratings0 reviews

    What did you think?

    Tap to rate

    Review must be at least 10 words

      Book preview

      The Bribe - Oskar Klausenstock

      c$Oabook_preview_excerpt.html\˲qX z.mڲ!Ε9#g$+4P J/9')rv(Tee<~yW/W_^8ǩzYgyp~2_*?}V.}0|3.}7?7Շ7߼{uk&UOs5iUPͩ T͗XK!\Ry釪b9Vuu̩k|4vȇ* MXP]bq4O-VT=wS/Hq1kRi(iᘦp&k%+:L8\1)^hRd^ٯ0c)9q$m-tW[kt ˋTO=pHXތGW_*ixXRqzxُ(6SMhAp/:ۈ+bì񿋗=i0qD/!cP}Aoo>}TyN{W\tR %p} YVobSP}5A &TK;C(=07*^3g_VO)4"ƛlOJE1y(P6"u.xru4loá߸*4#vݡt[<_]l33ĄikzMItPP鿕Vxq7jQC8dO XC+C8gNmzzS|1վjMq.'{&K}ĦްO>Ts MNa$P,EJи~:G١,jrs8G܇՜͞⩋Yf9S)MNΐ?Ҏ=7#m/,]lvZHcu)]m0\eak)ԄѴPþa?5P ҏSN& GBÂ~J;}|La'&t%1)5Q5.,wSO}gP eS2=@wuOPCC&$:"QmSTapgPsETGZ -8e֚Up-vu z#DܞPS6X;:l6ԣ/ߤ5)%%O(cxC/ir;btt "^*?%#S8<^ĠK%hjGo2NQ+΀u8ǐ瑞%01~߸xMM[;7!v:`km,o_'rrOl4qj'6x1@v\8ijS +۹; N. > ]GEƜm k6D wE[G^жi9_x׺0S<\=մ4S&i@`ypGm`7^F`|zZ Nj8sB"9v')#N UKp\\ ÙsXaVCKN@M8سCcQƻr:)$|"_b.j^\ ~G0m݌vg:^gҭAζ+@>beʮ|i2̝=2t('WGqKS"kxyHY|Fz׻mEF}@.N1‰M±ۉ [dP/Z&1Ē@󯞖)[+0͞CpF )Gȗ NWjtZ|)M O:mCNBf"v SvAw00]->;"mDs G_@ܭ0Q.'LDsd` j 51]F n@_Ƌ fLZ`'K8Rl m  t",8zƟyʊsǬZCI VII ](26U/Oo wھY !;!ڈ|wTx t.陵Sse4n/NpdH\9Lş5mLsj(A "cTEa̍e0e _ŮBxͤJ<"ZeXsL!^C2±Й!䥁| ȴ-RA ӕ~6xv(9 ^Wbfba oLlu΄]l1 YB]u8ϐ{)l-@(ǹ%Dl"k6"HCa욿W_z E@uU. y{fܓ>(a*1 <5,}4z4☞eJpʲWWsaFlH!H. HQ㈩yMVS7];b}J渳@;N!*"\'-b})Ϊ 'm r1oaD S=(q9BJ4x넷gx52B~- &YkdBP; >Qt79O LH~|zڣLh6CkᨠBS&욘 emϟ;f? *BCv+mq(2 ecLoYK%cʝ8B + @H1GiG2ӕ?)^8´=o_2t]wVl%aK&Duކ,wLoɛz@ڠĵ c0hb} |]}}(S^+Bät?g,r::]-fȜI)rR?0i;lm@ҶKqR* T0/CPğ a RBRϭ]:9Y&eegGjRG0+%7'J955hjAk'%Z $yBD+ S1~Mw+/\ p7c;(Ru=EP%)L)@he[ʭH;H\W8}2_1Y{=[0Jc`oi7Oe2̈́3šj>VqR w@'qD 6cpe%|ڤLpO ̴dF:|B;;D3mTp"w ֠a BN'׳By{#dݗ_yQ,]:;xVQZ _VU]p6Jd 0g1#$dpEeK1(٘רx˲m gew?R1 ՄB,ѽgA] X9 ͌M_JjeFK8XR֝PY*Ƿ"#q6!,KaJul*6EnB]^Es@@bbmM2q-xL4;9|^l?'Ns~$n1ض6=ijLu/!} ,}8D$N\m=XWW1TcKJBxzk"mu o:tݑp_.-:ahsJ[ᶥG=),AZblċOuHZv[?si+1ge<ؿ?pq%}.P%cQ?t'uKZYA۹ފ*+NJiJH }!$I+btS=O_m,qm`nűCoPhi" <>.;~lJi QЏ {tQSIA9~EmI5O}՞3-B@jr%Ua\ChP6:&ex"[Nug?Ԗy2%]tN{Q_s'o,/˪U'b!2v:R]I:j,EiBJfPs}:b<L/[QaCwSR/KʰAw:rɡs ֺr&ԑ!V]\O:ZbW֏s[U]l!fl:_s6e-9§Js+A8ŐRW9Hԥ%lQj8ɾW*%fX:{I^sx̣s[xzv;.q'n-%tFV`J( v򩴌c,}k7('G jlrBWbHk}Mô,?<'YtjdG99mkq7e{`v&xţJf+Cegm77aa/av(tխg447*qҞ$o5@}uQۯk g |؄mX˴ԼV/뮆14[KT堸s |hMl/}}={#B οLE[*:GK{ij#~0' `? 7ht?.RO#^%p~A~_T"_#]SK]H vQMXO'Wk٫w9ŏM5^mx~`P[1 TվD|;-?գ bjݰLMV+԰ oVE{$%OVw ڶF̱댞G5pf?ՌHBVcurT\:vkǭC{dzFr{ KWQZ؄CNR`g
      Enjoying the preview?
      Page 1 of 1