Passage to Freedom

Starred review from April 28, 1997
Mochizuki and Lee's (Baseball Saved Us) skillful volume pays tribute to Chiune Sugihara, a Japanese diplomat posted to Lithuania who in 1940 saved the lives of thousands of Polish Jews. Defying orders from his government, Sugihara handwrote visas for weeks to grant refugees passage through the Soviet Union to Japan. Told in the voice of his then-five-year-old son, the narrative centers upon the boy's impressions: the creaking of the bedsprings as his sleepless father tossed and turned, the Jewish children huddled outside the consulate, his mother massaging her husband's cramped arm. Lee's precise, haunting art, created by scratching out images from beeswax applied to paper and then adding oil paint and colored pencil, has the look of sepia-toned photographs: it unites carefully balanced compositions and emotional intensity. Mochizuki and Lee's inspired treatment brings out the import of Sugihara's brave and compassionate decision. An afterword by Sugihara's son updates the account: the family spent 18 months in a Soviet internment camp, and his father was stripped of his diplomatic post. A stirring story. Ages 4-up.

Books, particularly children's books, often transport readers to lands unknown or not yet explored. Books can be Aladdin's magic carpet or Emily Dickinson's frigate that takes us lands away. Picture books, with their evocative illustrations, amplify the adventures; better still, the picture book experience enhanced by audio interpretation. With PASSAGE TO FREEDOM, listeners will journey to Lithuania in 1940, where 5-year-old Hiroki Sugihara is witness to the decision of his father, the Japanese consul, to free desperate Polish Jewish refugees by writing them visas, despite his government's refusal. Children will respond to the judicious use of evocative music to punctuate a forthright narrative and will appreciate the extraordinary measure of heroism in the father and the generous spirit of his son. T.B. (c) AudioFile 2000, Portland, Maine