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| The Betrayal of Anne Frank by Rosemary Sullivan review – who tipped off the Nazis? | by Kathryn Hughes Feb 2, 2022 | Despite controversy surrounding its findings, the work of a ‘cold case team’ powerfully illuminates what it was like to live under a genocidal regime On 4 August 1944 Gestapo officer Karl Josef Silberbauer, together with three Dutch policemen, marched into a spice merchant’s on Amsterdam’s Prinsengracht and demanded: “Where are the Jews?” It was a piercing moment in 20th-century history, one that never becomes dulled by retelling. Within minutes Silberbauer and his accomplices had located a dummy bookshelf, behind which lay a secret suite of rooms where two families had been hiding for two years. Placed under arrest, these eight men and women were subsequently sent to concentration camps in the east from which only one, the business’s owner, Otto Frank, returned. We know all this because one of Frank’s first postwar acts was to publish the journal that his 15-year-old daughter had kept during their immuration. The Diary of Anne Frank became a canonical text, one of the few accounts we have of living through Hitler’s Final Solution in real time. And it is Anne’s face – peaky, clever, ferociously alive – that has become the emblem of all the evil unleashed by antisemitism in Europe’s terrible mid-century. Yet despite the story being so familiar, there is one detail that remains a mystery. Who tipped off the authorities that there were people hiding at the back of Prinsengracht 263? Continue reading... | | | Oliver Twist given new spin in BBC prequel to Charles Dickens novel | by Tara Conlan Feb 2, 2022 | Exclusive: spin-off based on Artful Dodger and crime-lord Fagin brings food poverty to fore Charles Dickens’ Oliver Twist is being given a new spin in a star-studded BBC prequel to the Victorian novel which highlights the parallels between food poverty in the 19th century and now. Echoing the most famous line from Dickens’ 1838 classic – “Please sir, I want some more” – and Marcus Rashford’s campaign to reduce child hunger, the writers of forthcoming 10-part family adventure series Dodger say they “made a conscious effort” to put food poverty “to the fore” in their show based on the exploits of Dickens’ characters The Artful Dodger and crime-lord Fagin. Continue reading... | | | Dying Light 2: Stay Human review – as dead inside as the zombie hordes | by Keith Stuart Feb 2, 2022 | PC, PS4/5, Xbox One/Series X, Nintendo Switch (upcoming); Techland If you’ve played a zombie game in the past decade, this mishmash of tattered post-apocalyptic stereotypes will feel all too familiar Aiden is a pilgrim, a nomadic survivor who wanders the zombie wastelands of Dying Light 2, taking goods from one settlement to another like some sort of post-apocalyptic Deliveroo rider. The search for his long-lost sibling has led him to a sprawling city somewhere in Europe. Here, three warring tribes endlessly fight for resources, using a familiar combination of melee combat and unconvincing dialogue. You take on missions for various shouting sociopaths, all competing to either save the world or blow it up, or some unfeasible combination of the two. Sound familiar? If you’ve played a zombie game in the past decade, it certainly should. The various territories of the city are all teeming with the undead, and also side-quests. Everywhere you go there are hidden weapon caches, bandit camps and train stations to unlock for fast travel, and windmills that must be powered up to create safe houses – a game design trope instantly recognisable to anyone who’s played an open-world adventure since 2012’s Far Cry 3. Indeed, Dying Light 2 feels like a B-movie undead reskin of Far Cry or Assassin’s Creed – rather like Days Gone. Continue reading... | | | A surfing god rides The Cradle of Storms – Chris Burkard's best photograph | by Interview by Graeme Green Feb 2, 2022 | ‘This is Josh Mulcoy, the godfather of cold-water surfing, catching a wave in Alaska. The place is so windy and wild, it’s known as The Cradle of Storms’ The Aleutian Islands are fabled in surfing. Part of the Pacific Ring of Fire, they’re a raw chain of islands connecting Alaska to Russia. The area is known as The Cradle of Storms because it’s so windy and wild. Most of the islands are made up of tundra and there are big active volcanoes. This island, Umnak, is home to a very small Aleut community. I went there in 2013. The planning alone took two years. You need to be completely self-sustained. You need to charter a small plane and have enough food and supplies for your entire stay, with the means to charge all your equipment. Continue reading... | | | | |
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