Birth date: May 8, 1924.
Birthplace: On the border between Poland and Czechoslovakia.
Occupation: Writer and lecturer.
Current home: Arizona.
Marital status: Married for 54 years to Kurt Klein. At the end of World War II, I was on the death march [from a Nazi slave-labor camp] and he was in the U.S. Army. We met on Liberation Day, May 7, 1945. I told my story in the film “One Survivor Remembers.”
Children: Three children and eight grandchildren from 10 to 24.
Working on: I will be in Chicago on Oct. 23 at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum’s Book and Author Luncheon at the Sheraton Chicago Hotel & Towers with my husband, Kurt, discussing our new book, “The Hours After: Letters of Love and Longing in War’s Aftermath” [St. Martin’s Press]. It’s a collection of letters written in the year between our meeting and our marriage.
The last good movies I saw: “Burnt by the Sun” and “Remains of the Day.”
The book I’ve been reading: Michael Korda’s “Another Life.”
Favorite meal: Chinese food, which I didn’t eat until I came to this country.
Favorite performers: Emma Thompson and Anthony Hopkins.
Personal heroes: Growing up, it was for a time Theodor Herzl, the father of Zionism. I’m very fond of Steven Spielberg, the Dalai Lama and Oprah Winfrey because they’re doing good things in this world.
If I could do it over: Considering everything that has happened to me, I’ve been very privileged.
I’d give anything to meet: The Dalai Lama, because he stands for so many things I admire.
My fantasy is: There is no hunger in the world. I was very hungry in my life for a very long time.
If I could change one thing about myself: I would be less impetuous.
Most humbling experience: When people put me on a pedestal, I don’t feel I’m worth it. Ninety percent of why I survived was luck.
My philosophy: Pain should not be wasted. It should be used to help other people. There is no pain that love cannot heal.
The three words that best describe me: I am driven.
