Swimming Upstream: A Jewish Refugee from Vienna

Swimming Upstream is a remarkable life story. Born in 1922 into a Viennese Jewish family, T. Scarlett Epstein was catapulted into immediate adulthood by the Austrian Anschluss. She had to learn to think on her feet in order to save herself and her family from the nightmares of the Holocaust. Her dangerous escape route took her from Yugoslavia to Albania; finally, after a terrifying flight via Germany, she arrived in England. Her ambitions to become a surgeon were dashed as she found herself sitting at a sewing machine in one of the many sweatshops in London. She attended night school and was awarded a scholarship to study for an economics degree. Days before her final exams she was severely burned in an accident. Unable to write and in excruciating pain, she dictated her exam answers from her hospital bed. Unlucky in love, she concentrated on her work and spent two years in Indian villages as part of her doctoral studies, which marked the beginning of a brilliant academic career. On he