A Life of Words

I learned yesterday (Saturday, April 10) that a former Dallas Morning News colleague, Jori Epstein, who now covers the Cowboys for USA Today, has done this amazing thing. She’s teamed up with Holocaust survivor Max Glauben, a most remarkable man about whom we’ve published many stories in the DMN, to tell his amazing life story in a book. In 2019, Max was the Dallas Morning News Texan of the Year.

His is a story that cried out for this, and he’d long wanted to write a book. Titled The Upstander — someone who speaks or acts in support of a person being attacked or bullied — the book chronicles not only how Max became the lone member of his immediate family to survive the Holocaust, but also how he’s spent his life on a mission to speak out against hate while preaching tolerance and resilience as he’s shared his experiences.

After surviving six concentration camps starting from age 15 in 1943, Max immigrated to the United States and served in the Korean conflict. He’s now 93 and Jori is 26, a 2016 graduate of the University of Texas. The 5-foot-3 Max calls Jori “guten neshama” — Yiddish for “good soul.” And he’s one of her best friends, like a grandfather and a parent in one courageous, compassionate soul.

The two have been working for over four years on the book, which published last month and is available on Amazon (see below). I hope it’ll come out on audiobook soon, because that’s how I’m reading most books for pleasure these days.

Mazel tov to Jori for this remarkable accomplishment and thank you to Max for continuing to share his story so we all may learn from his experiences and his wisdom, and never forget the atrocities that he and millions of others suffered.