February 24, 2011 – Charlottesville, VA — University of Virginia Professor Dariusz Tolcyk, of the Department of Slavic Languages and Literatures, invited Alice Waydenfeld Faintich to lecture about the Soviet deportations of Polish civilians during World War II for his course entitled “The Dark Side of the 20th Century.”

In giving her presentation for the class, Alice drew on her father’s book, The Ice Road: An Epic Journey from the Stalinist Labor Camps to Freedom, illuminating this little-known aspect of World War II with a multimedia PowerPoint.

In describing why she has taken on this project, Alice told journalist David Maurer of The Daily Progress: “I feel the book is important, because it tells about a part of World War II history that most people, beyond those to whom it happened, are not aware of.”

Reporting on Alice’s UVA lecture, journalist Maurer says in his Daily Progress article: “The book reads like an adventure yarn, even as it offers a cautionary tale of what can happen when evil systems of government are allowed to exist…Bearing witness against the unjust becomes the duty of the just. And, as Waydenfeld’s memoir proves, there is no time limit for doing this.”