Herman Rosenblat knew how to tell a story. At family occasions， he was the one who would 2)spin fantastic 3)yarns with only 4)a kernel of truth. One of Herman’s favorite stories was about how he met his wife Roma. He would recount the astonishing tale of how， as an 11-year-old Polish Jew 5)interned by the Nazis in a sub-camp of 6)Buchenwald， he was sustained by a young girl who came each day to throw him apples over the fence. He never knew her name. Twelve years later， Rosenblat was living in New York when a friend set him up on a 7)blind date. In an incredible twist of fate， the curly-haired woman with green eyes who was his date for the evening turned out to be his childhood savior， the girl who had thrown him apples all those years before: his “angel at the fence”. He proposed on the spot， against the twinkling lights of the 8)Coney Island amusement parks. They were married in 1958 and had two children.

To begin with， it was an anecdote he shared only with friends or new acquaintances. Then， in 1995， Rosenblat wrote it up and entered a newspaper competition to find the best Valentine’s Day-themed short story. He won and his story was featured on the front page of the 9)New York Post. Within months， the Rosenblats were appearing on The Oprah Winfrey Show， sitting hand in hand on a 10)cream sofa， in the full glare of studio lights. In the years that followed， Rosenblat was signed up by a literary agent who 11)brokered a book deal. The Rosenblats began appearing at local schools and Holocaust-education centers， with Herman giving his moving account of how love triumphed over the forces of hatred. He enjoyed the attention. Rosenblat’s memoir， Angel at the Fence， was 12)slated for publication by 13)Berkley Books in 2009. Life was good for the Rosenblats.

There was just one problem—it wasn’t true. Although Rosenblat did survive the Holocaust and his marriage to Roma was genuine， the story of a young girl throwing him apples was a 14)fabrication. His “angel at the fence” was a fake.

Doubts about the Rosenblat memoir started circulating on the Internet and were mentioned by the eminent Holocaust historian Deborah Lipstadt on her website as early as December 2007. Shortly afterwards， Danny Bloom， a 60-year-old 15)expatriate Jewish American living in Taiwan， picked up on some of the story’s 16)discrepancies and started emailing academic experts asking them to look into the 17)veracity of Rosenblat’s account. One of the academics Bloom emailed was Ken Waltzer， the professor of Jewish studies at 18)Michigan State University. Waltzer， who was writing a book about the children of Buchenwald， had already made his own 19)tentative inquiries into the Rosenblat story.

“In November 2008， I was contacted by two 20)forensic 21)genealogists who were investigating the memoir，” he explains. “They were able to give me maps of the Buchenwald sub-camp in 22)Schlieben. We already knew from survivor testimonies that to go to the fence was punishable by death and there was a high risk you would be 23)electrocuted. The maps showed that the only external fence was down by the 24)SS 25)barracks and that civilians had been banned from the road that ran alongside it since 1943 so there was no way that Herman and Roma could have had a 26)rendezvous.”

Waltzer and his associates then looked into the matter of Roma’s 27)whereabouts during the Second World War. In his story， Herman had claimed that Roma and her family were Polish Jews living under assumed identities on a nearby farm. There was no trace of them. “The 28)upshot of it all was that the family was some distance away in 29)Brieg，” says Waltzer. “The story was completely untrue. If Roma wasn’t there， then she wasn’t throwing him apples. There are no redemptive endings in the Holocaust. In this case， the dark truth was hidden to spin a story of romance， and that， to me， is a denial of the substance of the Holocaust .”

News of the Rosenblat 30)hoax finally broke last December. Berkley Books swiftly dropped plans to publish his memoir. Rosenblat issued a curiously unapologetic statement claiming that his motivation was “to make good in this world”. “I wanted to bring happiness to people， to remind them not to hate， but to love and tolerate all people，” the statement read. “In my dreams， Roma will always throw me an apple， but I now know it is only a dream.”

While Rosenblat’s fabrication expanded around him， his family knew he was lying. Both his children were said to have been deeply uncomfortable with the story and urged their parents to stay out of the media spotlight. Rosenblat’s rapid rise to semi-celebrity also caused an 31)irrevocable32)rift with his last surviving brother， Sam， who died in February 2007， still refusing to speak to him.

Perhaps there is a sense in which Rosenblat’s stories were a survival technique， a means of dissociating himself from the horrific experiences he underwent and of creating a new， happier ending for his own narrative. But when it became clear that Rosenblat’s supposedly harmless anecdotes were spiraling into something more worrying， there was a growing consensus that it was time to speak out. According to Waltzer: “There was a real fear that Herman Rosenblat would be adding a 33)fraudulent written record to Holocaust history. That would 34)discount the quality of other， true memoirs. And that would give further 35)ammunition to Holocaust-deniers. ”

赫爾曼#8226;羅森布拉特很會講故事。在家庭聚會上，他總能給一點小事添油加醋然后編出動人故事。赫爾曼最愛講的故事之一是他和妻子羅瑪?shù)南嘤?。他會這樣講述那令人驚奇不已的故事:當時，他是個年僅11歲的波蘭猶太男孩，被納粹分子關(guān)押在布痕瓦爾德的一個下屬集中營。有個小女孩每天都來看他，并從鐵絲網(wǎng)外扔蘋果給他吃?？伤麖膩聿恢浪拿帧?2年后，羅森布拉特在紐約生活。有一次，一位朋友幫他安排了一次相親。命運就是這么奇妙，那晚和他約會的那個綠眼睛、卷發(fā)女子正是他童年時的救星，那個多年前給他扔蘋果的人——他的“鐵絲網(wǎng)外的天使”。在科尼島游樂園閃爍的燈光下，他當場求婚。兩人于1958年結(jié)婚，之后有了兩個孩子。

一開始，這只是跟朋友和初相識的人分享的一段軼事。后來在1995年，羅森布拉特把故事寫了下來，參加一份報紙舉辦的以情人節(jié)為主題的短篇故事大賽并獲獎。他的這篇文章被刊登在《紐約郵報》的頭版。數(shù)月后，羅森布拉特夫婦獲邀參加《奧普拉#8226;溫弗瑞秀》，在演播廳鎂光燈的投射和聚焦中，兩人手拉手坐在米色沙發(fā)上接受采訪。之后的幾年里，一家文稿代理商和羅森布拉特簽約，替他談妥了一個出書計劃。羅森布拉特夫婦還開始到當?shù)氐膶W校和多個大屠殺教育中心演講，在那里，赫爾曼感人肺腑地講述愛如何戰(zhàn)勝仇恨。他享受眾人的關(guān)注。柏克利出版公司籌劃在2009年出版羅森布拉特的自傳《鐵絲網(wǎng)外的天使》。羅森布拉特一家的生活曾經(jīng)是那么的美好。

只是有一個問題——那故事并不真實。雖然羅森布拉特確實是大屠殺幸存者，他和羅瑪?shù)幕橐鲆彩钦娴模莻€小女孩向他扔蘋果的段子卻是虛構(gòu)的。他的“鐵絲網(wǎng)外的天使”是假的。

對于羅森布拉特的這段回憶錄，網(wǎng)絡(luò)早有存疑的聲音，而早在2007年12月，研究大屠殺的著名歷史學家黛博拉#8226;利普斯塔特就在她的網(wǎng)站上提出了質(zhì)疑。不久，居住在臺灣的60歲美籍猶太人丹尼#8226;布魯姆收集了羅森布拉特故事中的矛盾之處，并開始給多位學術(shù)專家寫郵件，請他們查證羅森布拉特所說故事的真實性?？?8226;沃爾茲是布魯姆寫郵件求助的學者之一，他是密歇根州立大學研究猶太人歷史的教授。沃爾茲正在寫一本有關(guān)布痕瓦爾德集中營孩子的書。而他也早已對羅森布拉特的故事開始其初步的研究核實。

“2008年11月，兩名正在調(diào)查羅森布拉特自傳的法庭系譜專家聯(lián)系了我，”他解釋說，“他們給了我位于施里本的布痕瓦爾德下屬集中營的一些地圖。從集中營幸存者的陳述中，我們已經(jīng)知道，走近鐵絲網(wǎng)圍欄是會被處死的，而且也很容易被鐵絲網(wǎng)電死。地圖顯示，唯一一段靠外的鐵絲網(wǎng)圍欄通向納粹黨衛(wèi)軍營地，而自1943年起，鐵絲網(wǎng)外沿的公路一直禁止平民進入。因此，赫爾曼和羅瑪絕不可能如他們說的那樣隔網(wǎng)相遇?！?/p>

接下來，沃爾茲和他的同事們開始查證二戰(zhàn)期間羅瑪?shù)男雄櫵凇０春諣柭陌姹?，他稱，羅瑪和她的家人是波蘭猶太人，當時以虛假的身份居住在附近的一個農(nóng)場。但一點證據(jù)都沒有?！白詈笳{(diào)查的結(jié)果是，羅瑪一家當時居住在較遠的布瑞格?！蔽譅柶澱f，“這故事完全是假的。如果羅瑪不在施里本，那么她也不可能從鐵絲網(wǎng)外向他扔蘋果。大屠殺的悲劇是不可挽回的。在這件事情上，為了講述一個浪漫的故事而掩蓋了黑暗的事實。在我看來，這是一種對大屠殺實質(zhì)的否認。”

去年12月，羅森布拉特的謊言最終被揭發(fā)曝光。柏克利出版公司立即取消了出版其自傳的計劃。羅森布拉特發(fā)表了一份耐人尋味而毫無歉意的聲明，宣稱他的動機是“給這個世界創(chuàng)造一些美好的東西?！薄拔蚁Ｍ麕Ыo人們快樂，提醒他們不要去憎恨，而是去愛和包容所有的人?！甭暶髦姓f，“在我的夢里，羅瑪將一直扔蘋果給我，但我現(xiàn)在知道，這只是個夢?！?/p>

羅森布拉特編造的謊言不斷膨脹擴大的時候，他的家人都知道他在撒謊。據(jù)說，他的兩個孩子都對這個謊言深感不安，還勸父母遠離媒體的聚光燈。憑借謊言快速成為半個名人這件事還導致羅森布拉特和他唯一活著的哥哥薩姆之間產(chǎn)生了一道不可彌合的裂痕。薩姆于2007年2月去世，至死都不愿和他說話。

也許，有人覺得羅森布拉特的謊言是一種求生存的方式，是一種讓自己脫離過去的恐怖經(jīng)歷并為自己的故事創(chuàng)造一個更快樂的新結(jié)局的方法。但是，當羅森布拉特那段本來無傷大雅的奇聞軼事逐漸演變成某種令人擔憂的謊言時，大家的共識就會越來越強烈，認為是時候說出真相了。如沃爾茲所說:“人們真的很擔心赫爾曼#8226;羅森布拉特會給大屠殺的歷史添上一筆具有欺騙性的書面記錄。這樣會有損其他真實的自傳作品的品質(zhì)。而且還會給否認大屠殺的那些人更多反駁的有力證據(jù)?！?/p>