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The “WOLF” lurks in the shadows of our soul and in the depth of our unconscious. There he waits, ready to leap, swiftly and suddenly, to annihilate our fragile life. What is the nature of the “wolf” and when does it strike? How are we to grapple with its haunting potential to blindside one when least expected, to steal one's life, one's vitality, and those whom one loves most dearly? Sophia Richman courageously addresses these questions in her absorbing and moving memoir, which depicts her own history as a hidden child of the Holocaust.
A Wolf in the Attic is the story of Richman's life, formed by the gripping inscription of her earliest years. Before the age of three, she lived a shadowy existence in Lwow, Poland, with the “unthought known” (Bollas, 1989) that she and her mother were posing as blond Catholics with fictitious identities. Her father, an escapee from a concentration camp, was hidden in an attic from December 1942 until July 1944, when the Russians liberated Lwow. Sophia was given an edict by her mother, not unlike the warning Little Red Riding Hood was given by her grandmother in the classic fairy tale, to stay away from the attic door to avoid the “mean, hungry wolf: if you open the door, he'll get out and eat you up” (p. 45). This book is the story of Richman's earliest traumatic experiences, the recovery of unconscious memories, and their imprint on her growing-up years, her adult work life, and her most intimate personal relationships.
Edgar Herzog (1983), a Jungian analyst, writes: