<Tr> <Th> Dewey Decimal </Th> <Td> 940.53 / 18350943841 22 </Td> </Tr> <Tr> <Th> LC Class </Th> <Td> D804. 66. Z33 A25 2007 </Td> </Tr> <P> The Zookeeper's Wife is a non-fiction book written by the poet and naturalist Diane Ackerman . Drawing on the unpublished diary of Antonina Żabiński's, it recounts the true story of how Antonina and her husband, Jan Żabiński, director of the Warsaw Zoo, saved the lives of 300 Jews who had been imprisoned in the Warsaw Ghetto following the German invasion of Poland on September 1, 1939 . The book was first published in 2007 by W.W. Norton . </P> <P> In the 1930s, Jan Żabiński was the director of the thriving zoo in Warsaw, Poland; his wife Antonina had a remarkable sympathy for animals, and their villa in the zoo was a nursery and residence for numerous animals as well as their son . This life came to an abrupt end with the German invasion of Poland on September 1, 1939, which started World War II (1939--1945). Most of the zoo's animals and structures were destroyed in the bombings and siege of the city . The zoo was closed under German occupation, but the Żabińskis continued to occupy the villa, and the zoo itself was used first as a pig farm and subsequently as a fur farm . </P>

What's the story behind the zookeeper's wife