Whatever happened to 'never again?'

I dreamed about my mother last night. She was standing in an elegant room, surrounded by people admiring her beauty. I stood apart, so proud she was my mother. When I woke up, I knew the dream signalled the end of my long quest to untangle the truth of her life. 

My quest began when I started writing The Golden Daughter, about my mother’s secret past and how it impacted me. It was often liberating, as I sorted fact from fiction, and it was enriching, as I discovered many truths about myself, and the ultimate truth about my birth father.

But it’s been painful, too. Painful for me personally, to keep re-living episodes that I have done my best to ignore for more than half a century.

The biggest pain, though, was when I came face to face with the nature of my mother’s wartime experiences. I had no idea she was snatched from school at 17, and enslaved by the Nazis; no idea she was forced to march 3 km to and from a factory to stand on a production line 12 hours a day making ball bearings for the German war machine; no idea that when the Allies bombed the factory, as they did 22 times, she had to seek sanctuary in a scrape in the ground because the bomb shelters were only for those loyal to the Fuhrer.

Inevitably my feelings turned to anger against the psychopathic monster responsible for so much pain and loss across so many nations. A man who exploited the economic uncertainties of the 30s, who passed decrees overriding individual freedoms, and who manipulated public opinion by suggesting his nation's ills were all the responsibility of Jews and 'inferior people.'

Hitler had a simple philosophy. He wrote about it in his 1925 manifesto, Mein Kampf: if you’re going to lie, make the lie big. Make it simple. Keep saying it. Eventually, they will believe it.

I got angry that this one man, with his big lies, his lust for power, his ability to seize the levers of authority, his ability to eliminate dissent, had turned a 17 year-old girl who dreamed of being a pharmacist into one of five million slave workers for Germany. 

Many of these slave labourers survived the war, but could never return to their homelands.

'Never again', we told ourselves, as we looked back on a conflict that saw six million European Jews murdered.

And yet, as I complete the story of my mother's experiences in a world ruined by a man who championed 'the big lie', I am frustrated by the rise of another demagogue using the same playbook.

We know from Ivana Trump that Donald Trump's nighttime reading included a collection of Hitler's speeches. Useful homework, if you are looking for lines that denigrate your enemies as 'vermin' or suggest immigrants are 'poisoning the blood.'

Make the lie big. Make it simple. Keep saying it. Eventually, they will believe it.

Hitler wrote in Mein Kampf: "Even when presented with the true facts, [the average voter] will still doubt and waver and will continue to take at least some of the lie to be true. For the most impudent lie always leaves something lingering behind it, a fact which is known only too well to all great expert liars in this world."

Never again, we said.

Canadian author, musician and politician Charlie Angus wrote recently: 'The big lie has driven Trump's political success from the beginning. He continues to rely on it, as he drives deep wedges into American society and blows apart longstanding alliances and global partnerships."

So when are we going to wake up? What are we going to do about it? We can’t let this happen again.

The Golden Daughter: My Mother's Secret Past as a Ukrainian Slave Worker in Nazi Germany will be published by House of Anansi on August 5, 2025. It's already available for pre-order at Indigo, Amazon and your local bookstore.