Spis treści
- Year of publication: 2014
- Source: Show
- Pages: 3-6
- DOI Address: -
- PDF: pbs/2/pbs2toc.pdf
Between the Khrushchev Thaw and the collapse of the Polish People’s Republic – historians from Poland discuss biography studies
In the Polish People’s Republic, there was a heated discussion about biography studies, especially after 1956, when the agenda from the co-called “Otwock directives” was abolished. It was once again possible to expand historical reflections to include people and their unique contribution to the shape of the history. Marxist guidelines, however, were not abandoned totally. The most pressing issue was to find a method that would on the one hand satisfy historians, and, on the other, be acceptable to the country’s authorities. Many solutions were suggested and this paper focuses on them. The starting point is the reflections included in editorials in “Kwartalnik Historyczny”, “Dzieje Najnowsze” and other periodicals. As the matter of fact, the meaning of discussions in the communist era goes beyond the historical dimension and encourages the reflection on contemporary biography studies.
Why the biographies of people from the Polish People’s Republic are not appreciated?
The first twenty-five years of the Third Polish Republic saw only a few – well or not so well written – monographs devoted solely to important and significant political figures of that time. Monographs with their clear structure – a description of a person’s life from birth to death – are preferred choice of researchers as well as the wider audience of history lovers. These books feature a person against the historical background of a particular epoch and it is therefore essential to keep the right proportions between a personal story and the historical background. Finally, – and in my opinion this is probably most important – distinguished individuals, who in general feature as the main characters of biographies, grasp readers’ attention because the question whether it is an individual who shapes the reality or rather the rather way round, always remains valid. Without biographies then, it would probably be impossible to explain certain issues, phenomena and events.
Roman Zambrowski. A biography of a communist – sources and research methodology
The example of the biography of Roman Zambrowski is used to highlight the troubles with recreating the story and views of the Polish communist. First of all, the base of sources for such work must be characterised, especially the Comintern archives, memoirs and personal accounts. Discussing the specific content of Polish communists’ personal files drawn up in Moscow is essential. Moreover, I will also discuss the biography as a pretext to outline the political environment, i.e. a group of communist activists from the “Polish Communist Party generation”, through the perspective of Zambrowski’s life.
Intellectual biographies of a National Democracy’s political thought creators in the Second Polish Republic. A bibliographical reconnaissance
Biographical research is alive and present continuously for many years in our socio-political literature. To a large extent it is determined by the fact that issues of individual stories and the formation of the outstanding personalities of people that deserve a factual description of their lives constantly intrigue the researchers. What also seems to be important is the continuous popularity of this literary genre to a wide range of readers. Tracking and recording subsequent stages of individuals’ intellectual development, observation of their actions and the consequences of their public activities usually comprise an interesting experiment which also allows to verify the magnitude of a described hero.
A portrait, a dictionary and a silva rerum... Literary biography studies at the turn of the 21st century
This paper discusses the status of literary biographic studies at the turn of the 21th century in Poland. It points out to how the methodological transition in literature studies influenced changes in literary biographic studies, namely the weakening impact of structuralism and the introduction of new scientific paradigms. The question how the convention of describing characters in other human and social sciences, i.e. history, psychology, sociology and philosophy, influenced the position and concept of literary biographic studies, is also discussed.
Icchak Cukierman, Aba Kowner and Eliezer Lidowski − the people who arranged the post-war Jewish migration to Palestine
The paper describes three Zionists who organized illegal emigration of Jewish population from Poland between 1944−1947. Two of them − Icchak Cukierman and Aba Kowner are well known as Ghetto Fighters from Warsaw and Vilna. Eliezer Lidowski was a Jewish partisan from Baranowicze. In 1944 they’ve started organizing illegal emigration to Palestine (the so-called Bricha). Kowner and Lidowski left Poland and formed special unit named “Nakam” − Revenge. “Nakam” was a group of assassins that targeted Nazi war criminals with the aim of avenging the Holocaust. On April 14 1946, “Nakam” painted with diluted arsenic some loaves of bread for the 12 000 German POWs from the Langwasser internment camp near Nuremberg (Stalag XIII). Before that, Kowner had been arrested by British Militia and spent some time in prisons in Cairo and Jerusalem. Till 1947 Lidowski has worked as Bricha member in Italy. After The Kielce’ Pogrom (4 of July 1946) Icchak Cukierman done an unofficial deal with communist authorities in Poland under which border crossings were opened secretly. With the silent consent of the authorities, the Bricha movement in Poland spread to a massive scale. By 1947, about 140 000 Jews left Poland illegally. In 1947 the borders were closed as the authorities feared the reaction of the British diplomacy. Cukierman, Lidowski and Kowner finally settled in Israel and lived in kibbutzim till their death.
FA philologist in an archives. In search of sources for Jakub Laskier’s biography
The article discusses the archivist angle of work, i.e. the acquisition of data and materials necessary to bring together different pieces of occupation-time life of Jakub Laskiera. Jakub Laskier was a Polish assimilated Jew, an educated banker and a Zionist (he spent some time in a kibbutz in Degania Alef, Palestine, and was a member of Aron Gordon’s group). He was in Auschwitz and Sachsenhausen concentration camps during the Holocaust and took part in a secret mission called the “Bernhard’s operation”, the historical value of which is worth recalling.
Eugeniusz Kwiatkowski about Szczecin and the West Pomerania region
Eugeniusz Kwiatkowski (1888–1974) created the maritime policy of the Second Polish Republic. Before the war, in 1926–1930 and 1935–1939, he had a significant impact on the Polish economic policy. At that time, he saw Szczecin mostly as a competitor for the Polish free-trade harbour zone (Gdańsk & Gdynia) and the West Pomerania region as an exploiter of cheap Polish labour force in their local estates. The post-war boarder changes obviously changed his views. Kwiatkowski became one of the most important supporters of the reconstruction of Szczecin’s harbour, connecting the city and the region to the rest of the country by building infrastructure, and establishing a genuine maritime academy. The plans drawn up in the first post-war years were in large parts abandoned. The West Pomerania region and its neighbourhood, however, remained an important part of Kwiatkowski’s views on modern policies.
Mirosław Szumiło, Roman Zambrowski 1909–1977. A study of the communist elite in Poland. Instytut Pamięci Narodowej. Warszawa 2014, s. 528. ISBN 978-83-7629-621-0
Henryk Łakomy (†), 2006, François Mitterrand. Political biography, Wydawnictwo Naukowe Akademii Pedagogicznej Kraków. Kraków. s. 222. ISBN 83-7271-396-0.
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