Rebecca Hillesum

Etty's mother. A homemaker, Rebecca HIllesum and her daughter had a somewhat strained relationship. In the beginning, Etty expresses her displeasure with her mother. By the end of Letters from Westerbork, however, Etty's attitude toward her mother is completely transformed. Rebecca Hillesum is a rather high-strung woman. It is obvious that prior to volunteering to go to Westerbork, Etty neither knows nor understands her mother very well. One thing Etty fully understands, though, is that the greed which her mother exhibits is the same greed which presents itself in Etty. There is, in her greed, a grasping quality which surprises and disappoints Etty when she examines it closely. The tendency to cling to people, places, and things for validation is a primary motivating factor in Etty's decision to change herself from the inside out. At Westerbork, Rebecca Hillesum becomes, for her only daughter, a sympathetic, caring woman...