Schindler's Ark Schindler's Ark Schindler's Ark (released in America as Schindler's List) is a Booker Prize-winning historical fiction novel published in 1982 by Australian novelist Thomas Keneally, which was later adapted into the highly successful movie "Schindler's List" directed by Steven Spielberg. The United States version of the book was called "Schindler's List" from the beginning; it was later reissued in Commonwealth countries under that name as well. The novel was also awarded the Los Angeles Times Book Prize for Fiction in 1983. The book tells the story of Oskar Schindler, a Nazi Party member who turns into an unlikely hero by
Poldek Pfefferberg death in 1974 seemed to end any possibility of a film. In 1980 when Thomas Keneally went into Pfefferberg's shop to ask about the price of briefcases, Pfefferberg learned that Keneally was a novelist and showed him his extensive files on Schindler. Keneally was interested, and Pfefferberg became an advisor for the book, accompanying Keneally to Poland where they visited Kraków and the sites associated with the Schindler story. Keneally dedicated "Schindler's Ark" to Pfefferberg: "who by zeal and persistence caused this book to be written." Pfefferberg explained the reasons behind his efforts to have the Schindler story told as: