Joan Baez singing the musical setting of this poem by renowned Greek composer Mikis Theodorakis.
Look how beautiful my beloved is
Wearing her everyday dress
And a small comb in her hair.
No one knew how beautiful she really was.
Young women of Auschwitz,
Dauchau’s young women
Have you not seen my beloved?
We saw her starting a long journey
No longer was she wearing her dress
Nor the small comb in her hair.
Look how beautiful my beloved is,
So pampered by her mother
And her brother’s sweet kisses.
No one knew how beautiful she really was.
Women of Mauthausen,
Women of Belsen,
Have you not seen my beloved?
We saw her at the freezing plaza
With a number on her snow white arm,
And a yellow star laid on her heart.
Look how beautiful my beloved is,
So pampered by her mother
And her brother’s sweet kisses.
No one knew how beautiful she really was.
Iakovos Kambanellis was born in 1921 in Hora in the island of Naxos. Kambanellis was one of the most prominent Greek playwrights of the 20th century and he is considered to be the father of modern Greek theater. As a survivor of the Mauthausen-Gusen concentration camp, he wrote the lyrics of the “Mauthausen Trilogy” with music by Mikis Theodorakis. He has also written a memoir known as Mauthausen, describing his experiences from the concentration camp. He wrote the scripts of at least 12 films and directed three of them.
