Lisa Fittko

[1] The author of two memoirs about wartime Europe, Fittko is also known for her assisting German philosopher and critic Walter Benjamin in getting out of France to escape the Nazis in 1940.

Lisa Fittko was born into an international Jewish family (Simon, Ekstein)[clarification needed] in 1909 in Uzhhorod, Ung County, Kingdom of Hungary.

She worked as an underground resistance fighter in Berlin, Prague (where she met her husband and comrade Hans Fittko), Zurich, Amsterdam, Paris, Marseilles and finally, in the Pyrenees where from 1940 to 1941, she escorted refugees into Spain.

[2] Fittko was an émigré herself wanting to get to Portugal, to be able to take a boat to escape to the U.S. but she remained in Banyuls-sur-mer to participate in Varian Fry's "border project" [3] (Emergency Rescue Committee) and help many others.

[6] Speculations as to its contents have been the subject of scholarly articles and artistic works inspired by Benjamin's story and Lisa Fittko's account of it in her books.