The Bogdanow Lectures in Holocaust Studies

2021

The Holocaust at eye level: László Nemes, Oscar-winning director of Son of Saul (2015) in conversation

The University of Manchester Centre for Jewish Studies is pleased to announce that its 2021 Bogdanow Lectures in Holocaust Studies was delivered by Oscar-winning film director László Nemes. The globally acclaimed filmmaker, whose 2015 film Son of Saul won numerous international prizes including an Academy Award, the Grand Prix, the Golden Globe and BAFTA, spoke on the topic of Holocaust portrayals in fiction film.

The opening address for the event was given by Chancellor of the University of Manchester Lemn Sissay.

Tues 9 February 2021 - 6pm live online public event. 'The Holocaust at Eye Level: László Nemes, Oscar-Winning Director of Son of Saul (2015) in Conversation' with Cathy Gelbin, Professor of Film and German Studies at Manchester University, Department of Drama. Followed by public Q&A. This was a free online event.

Weds 10 February 2021- 2pm live online Masterclass 'Film in the Face of Historical Crisis' for University of Manchester students and staff. László Nemes’ masterclass will treat the cinematic and ethical implications of portraying historical violence and the crumbling of civilisation in relation to his films Son of Saul and, more recently, Sunset. From there, he will turn to issues of subjectivity and the role of the viewer in today’s cinema; namely, the disappearance of the viewer-film relationship – toward a flow of standardised, television-compatible, interchangeable films.

The Bogdanow Lectures Bequest

This annual public lecture series has been made possible as a result of the generous bequest to the University by Fanni Bogdanow (1927-2013), a former Professor of French and Medieval Studies at Manchester and a child refugee on the Kindertransporte.

"Fanni Bogdanow was born in Düsseldorf, Germany. When she was 11, in 1939 and just in time, her parents loaded her on to a Kindertransport train bound for Britain. She was taken in by a Quaker family in Manchester to whom she remained very grateful. In 1945, she won a scholarship to study French at Manchester University; she was to stay at Manchester, as undergraduate, postgraduate, lecturer, reader and professor, for the rest of her life. Her parents, astonishingly, survived between them Dachau, Auschwitz and Bergen-Belsen; to Fanni's intense joy, her mother later joined her in Manchester..." [More from The Guardian]

Fanni Bogdanow's full life story interview was conducted in April 2002 by one of the Centre's previous PhD students, Ros Livshin, and was archived at the Oral Testimony Archive of the Manchester Jewish Museum, a collection compiled under the supervison of the Centre's Bill Williams.