ABSTRACT
The Germans occupied Italy from mid-September 1943 until mid-April 1945. In Rome, on Saturday 16 October 1943, they organised and carried out the largest single round-up and deportation of Jews from Italy. Today, this Roman round-up epitomises the persecution of Jews in Italy. In the last eighty years, sixteen literary texts have been published about the round-up. However, there is only one picture book written for children on the subject. It is Portico d’Ottavia (2015) by Anna Foa. This chapter analyses how Foa made accessible to children the complicated and controversial issue of the Church’s relations with the Germans in occupied Rome, discussing in particular the strategies used to engage young readers – by appealing to their empathy and developing a sense of identification with the victims – in a way that would not be traumatic for them.
