I most highly recommend this book for students of history, especially WWII. It is gripping, the character portrayals are so real... as is the story

I concur with others who claim this book changed their life. I read this book in high school in the mid 60s, and in my small Iowa town, where no Jews live, I became familiar with a minority that had borne unspeakable horror. Mr. Vrba was a teenage Slovak Jew that was deported from his country. In a series of almost miraculous events, he was able to secret himself and escape after nearly 3 years in this death camp. This book is blunt and gripping in its reality, and yet I felt that it was probably worse than he reported. It gave me a morbid awareness, that these unspeakable acts should never be forgotten (or forgiven)in the hope that in the telling they will never recur. I highly recommend this book to those who don't believe the awfulness of the Nazi "Final Solution" because this will open their eyes.

I read I Cannot Forgive many years ago. Unitl that time (the 1960s) the Holocaust was an abstract event that happened before my birth. Verba's characterization of the events leading to his experiences in Auschwitz, the details of the life and deaths within the camp, and the personalities of the people, both prisoners and guards he interacted with MADE me aware of the darkest chapter in human history, and started me on a life avocation. His daring escape from KZ Auchwitz and the almost unbelievable disregard of his report on conditions there reads like a thriller, but sadily it is all true.

I have never been interested in the holocaust. Perhaps I have deliberately avoided that topic, but Rodulf Vrba's book is a sharp, profound yet not too sentimental of the horrors a human being can commit to another

This book gives an amazing look inside Auchwitz Prison during World War II, through the eyes of a prisoner who escaped. It has all the elements of good dramatic fiction, but it's true. There is a lot of factual detail, but the text is not gory, nor is it a dry recital. Well written, a very good read, and thought provoking. Highly recommend. This will be required reading for my high school children.

This is the only book I have read that describes the horrors of the deportation of Jews from Poland in such a personal fashion, and brings to life the incredible bravery, and degradation they suffered. I read it at age 15 and consider it the most meaningful of the thousands of books I've read.

This book is undoubtably one of the best written books on the Holocaust and stands together with such masterpieces as Olga Lengyel's 'Five Chimneys' and Alicia Appleman-Jurman's 'Alicia, my story'. Vrba writes in a plain, informative, no holds barred fashion and describes in intense detail his escape from Slovakia to Hungary, the time at Novacky Camp in Slovakia and ultimately the time he spent in Auschwitz. His escape from Auschwitz together with Fred Wetzler is nothing short of a miracle. This book seems to have been forgotten and does not appear on the shelves in bookshops these days and it really should as one of the best testimonies from the era.

I read this book when I was a teenager in the sixties. It was my education in the Holocaust and the concentration camps of WWII Europe. The book made such an impact on me, I remember the title to this day. It's a story of courage and determination, and it's a wonderful example of the strength of the human spirit. It should be required reading.

Although a testimonial full of unbearable, vivid horror and suffering, it isn't this that makes Vber's book so gripping, and so important. What endures is his robust personality, his unbelievable physical tenacity, and, incredibly enough, his sense of humour. In short, his character. Life in the camps was capricious enough, but this book slaps you with the fact that only those with a great and unshakable optimism had any chance at all. And moral people? Forget it. Dead within hours. The survivors had to tread on bodies to stay afloat. Talk about natural selection.