Ode to Joy English 2026

This is the story of an ordinary little boy, Ib Katznelson, swept up in the cataclysmic tides of fascism, war and propaganda. A generation later, his daughter-in-law, filmmaker Sarah Gavron, inspired by Ib's story, finds artist-poet Sophie Herxheimer to collaborate on telling it in a new, visual form. We follow Ib and his family's attempt to escape Denmark in 1943, and their eventual arrival at Theresienstadt, the 'model' concentration camp. Here the Nazis' horrors were hidden from the world, yet it was also a place where, somehow, art and culture flourished in secret. Satirical cabarets entertained the starving in desolate attics, children made breathtaking works of art, huge choirs sang together about death. This epic graphic novel contains all of life, from its darkest moments to its most precious and surprising joys. It is a tribute to those for whom the imagination was their only escape: a way not to just to survive, but to stay human.