Handbook of Polish, Czech and Slovak Holocaust Fiction: Works and Contexts
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Handbook of Polish, Czech and Slovak Holocaust Fiction: Works and Contexts Štěpán Balík— Agata Firlej— Elisa Hiemer— Jiří Holý— Hana Nichtburgerová Handbook of Polish, Czech and Slovak Holocaust Fiction This handbook project is the result of along-term cooperation between Polish, Czech, and German researchers in the field of Slavic and Comparative Studies. During the last 10 years, this team has published about adozen books in various languages and organized eight international workshops concerning the Holocaust in Central European literatures and cultures. Throughout these years, our team has noticed agap between the literary production in countries where the Holocaust mainly took place and their response in the non-Slavic world. For this reason, we are going to edit ahandbook with works originally published in Polish, Czech, or Slovak that are of importance not only within the context of their respective national literary traditions but also for research on Holocaust literature worldwide. Additionally, this project has been joined by Slovak researchers. The handbook includes novels, short stories, poems and plays within the scope of 750 standard pages. The table of contents currently lists 53 Polish, 41 Czech, and 22 Slovak texts. The editors provide an introduction about the main developments of Holocaust literature in the broader context of the countries of interest (main topics and motifs, periodisation based on political changes, reception processes in national and transnational context). We aim at making these literatures visible for non-Slavic recipients in order to overcome their underrepresentation in Holocaust Studies (and to improve the visibility of ‘small’ literatures in order to encourage publishing houses to commission translations). This underrepresentation is apparent in the existing anthologies: *e Reference Guide to Holocaust Literature (ed. T.Riggs, 2002) presents 225 authors but only two of them are of Czech origin, three Slovak. Polish authors fare slightly better, at 23. Out of 312 texts in Holocaust Literature: An Encyclopedia of Writers and *eir Work (ed. S.L.Kremer, 2003), we count 31 Polish, three Czech, and not asingle Slovak entry. Of the 43 articles featured in Holocaust Novelists (ed. E.Sicher, 2004) three are by Polish and four by Czech authors. Holocaust Literature I–II (ed. J.K.Roth, 2008) presents 109 works, of which only three are by Polish and two by Czech authors (there are no Slovak authors). The entry on Holocaust literature in the Oxford Handbook of Holocaust Studies (eds. P.Hayes and J.K.Roth, 2010) mentions three Polish authors but none of Czech or Slovak origin. OPEN ACCESS
180 SLOVO A SMYSL 34 All entries in our handbook will be edited in accordance with academic standards, but also written in away that encourages the broader public to learn more about this topic. Each entry contains practical information (about translations, film adaptations, the author) but mainly focuses on ashort summary of the plot and areview of the main issues and problems. We pay particular attention to the comparative aspect, providing cross references to other entries in the book (marked by an arrow signed→) as well as motifs, topics, characters, situations and literary devices mentioned in others books (→ ‘Aryan papers’, aryanisation, Jewish nose, postmemory, Jozef Tiso, grotesque, shtetl, etc.). In addition to this overview, each article deals with the specific national, historical background of aliterary text, and with relevant discussions in its country of origin. Such contextualization will be indispensable for researchers in other fields who are not familiar with the historical and sociocultural contexts. Every entry ends with ashort selected bibliography (also featured in English translation) directing the reader towards further study. Although we focus on the three national literatures most underrepresented in current Holocaust research, the task is most urgent in the case of Slovak literature. The handbook aims to increase the visibility and versatility of all these national literatures in academic scholarship dealing with representations of the Holocaust in the arts. Furthermore, we provide both encyclopaedic knowledge about the literary output of each region and an overview of the debates that have accompanied the works, as well as pointing out similarities in narration and motif choice. Publication of the handbook is expected in 2021 by De Gruyter, apublishing house known for its Jewish Studies Series. We intend to increase the visibility of the project’s outcome by creating an Open Access Handbook and covering the printing costs of this hybrid publication type. We present three entries below which represent Slovak and Polish literature. THE CLERICAL REPUBLIC (FARSKÁ REPUBLIKA) Author: Dominik Tatarka First Published: 1948 Translations: Czech (Farská republika, 1949; new translation 1961); Hungarian (Aplébános köztársasága, 1951; new translation Reverendás köztársaság, 1997); German (Die Pfaffenrepublik, 1960); Ukrainian (Popivs’ka respublika, 1961); Russian (Respublika popov, 1966). About the Author: Dominik Tatarka (1913–1989) was born in Drienové in the Kysuce region of North-Western Slovakia into alarge family of peasants. When his father was killed during World War I, his mother had to take care of him and his five sisters alone. He studied French and Czech Philology at Charles University in Prague and at the Sorbonne in Paris (1934–1939). During World War II he taught at high schools in Žilina (1939–1941) and Martin (1941–1944). In 1944 Tatarka became amember of the Communist Party and took part in the → Slovak National Uprising against Nazi OPEN ACCESS
HANDBOOK OF POLISH, CZECH AND SLOVAK HOLOCAUST FICTION 181 Germany. After the war he worked as ajournalist and scriptwriter. His works often reflect his personal experiences. His first pieces of prose were influenced by Surrealism and the avant-garde. Tatarka translated French works (Musset, Maupassant, and Vercors) into Slovak. In 1956, he wrote asatirical short story, *e Demon of Conformism, against Stalinism (it was published in the journal Kultúrny život in 1956, but was not released as abook until 1963). Tatarka protested against the Warsaw Pact occupation of Czechoslovakia in 1968 and resigned from membership in the Communist Party. In the 1970s and 1980s he was persecuted by the Communist regime, which banned him from public life and would not allow him to publish anymore. Starting in 1970 he worked as aforest worker, later subsisting as apermanently disabled pensioner. His works were published only in → samizdat or exile publishing houses. He was one of the few Slovak signatories of → Charter 77. In October 1987 he signed the first Charter’s Declaration on the deportation of Jews from Slovakia (on the 45th anniversary of the deportations organized by the Slovak government). → transport from Slovakia. Further Important Publications: Panna Zázračnica (1942, The Miraculous Virgin; novelette); Démon súhlasu (1963, The Demon of Conformism; satirical short stories); Prútené kreslá (1963, Wicker Armchairs; prose); Proti démonom (1968, Against the Demons; essays); Písačky (samizdat 1979, Köln 1984, Scribbles; reflections, reports and letters); Sám proti noci (in the Czech translation, München 1984, Alone Against the Night; reflections); Navrávačky (samizdat 1987, Köln 1988, Recordings; memoir). Content and Interpretation The story is set in Žilina, atown in North-Western Slovakia, and its surroundings in the years 1939–1941. These years are the first of the Slovak → clerofascist republic referred to in the title of the novel. The main character is ayoung teacher named Tomáš Menkina, whose life in some ways resembles that of the author. Tomáš grew up in anearby village. His father died when Tomáš was achild. Fortunately, they had an uncle in the U.S., John Menkina, who supported the family and paid for Tomáš’s studies. The plot of the novel begins at the moment when John Menkina returns home from America after several decades. At the same time Tomáš returns from his military service in Poland, where the Slovak army has been fighting alongside the Germans in the war against the Poles. Neither Tomáš nor his uncle support the clerofascist and nationalist regime that holds power in the Slovak government, aregime that is allied with Hitler’s Germany and that persecutes leftist intellectuals and workers, as well as Jews. Portrayed as acoward and ahypocrite, Belo Kováľ, the director of the high school where Tomáš teaches, enforces aclerofascist ideology. Tomáš and his colleagues— Darina Introbusová, daughter of the Lutheran pastor, and Fraňo Lašut, ‘aquarter Jew’— all feel the same intense disgust and annoyance towards him. Tomáš admires Darina, but he sleeps with the innkeeper’s wife Achinka. Fraňo decides to save aJewish girl, Edita Soláni, from the persecution, convincing Darina’s father to falsify her baptismal letter. → ‘Aryan papers’. Fraňo wants to marry her, but they are exposed. Names of all the baptized Jews are printed in the newspapers and the pastor OPEN ACCESS
182 SLOVO A SMYSL 34 is arrested. Tomáš revolts against the obligatory visit to the church, his spiritual exercises, and confession. The real change in Tomáš’ life and beliefs comes when he is imprisoned for carrying asuitcase that— unbeknownst to him— is full of leaflets, given to him by his Communist friend Lyčka. He is detained. To help Tomáš, his mother, apious and simple Christian woman, goes to aRoman Catholic priest named → Jozef Tiso, who is also president of the Slovak Republic, pleading him for mercy. Instead, Tiso orders arigorous investigation of the affair. Convinced that Tomáš is amember of the → Communist resistance, the police subject him to harsh interrogation and maltreatment, and Tomáš ends up spending ten months in prison. It is this turn of events, ironically, that persuades him to become acommunist and an opponent of the regime. In counterpoint to this transformation, Tomáš’s uncle John Menkina becomes more and more conformist, ‘aryanising’ → aryanisation ahotel and pub that have been confiscated from Jewish owners, and hosting agents of the fascist regime there. Returning from prison, Tomáš distances himself from his mother and uncle. With Hitler’s declaration of war against the Soviet Union, the Slovak army joins its German allies, and Tomáš receives his orders to depart for the front. The first version of *e Clerical Republic was written during the war (Olonovová, 1993, p.300). In the early 1950s, when Stalinist Communists established the doctrine of → Socialist Realism, Tatarka was critized for his ‘naturalism’ in the novel, and for ‘underestimating the role of the Communist Party’. He was forced to eliminate some scenes of sexual intercourse between Tomáš and Achinka (Petrík, 2013). → censorship. While the novel depicts real historical characters and places, and draws on autobiographical motifs (see above), it is also awork of fiction. Some characters are depicted in ironic and caricaturesque manner, namely the Slovak president and priest Jozef Tiso, the director of the school, and military guards. The novel utilizes modernist and avant-garde devices. The plot is not presented in atraditionally realistic fashion, but through avariety of hints, abbreviations, and metaphors, drawing as well on fantastic and imaginative elements. For instance, scenes depicting prison violence and brutality are not presented in their entirety but indicated obliquely, by virtue of this or that detail (Hudymač, 2008). Similarly, the Communist orientation of the workers is suggested by the red colour of the dirt under their finger nails (Tatarka, 1948, p.173) and red signs marking the trails in the mountains (p.248). Main Topics and Problems Tatarka’s treatment of such motifs as disgust, depression, nausea, and annoyance, as well as ‘hygienic love’ (Tomáš’ relationship with Achinka was only physical), may have been inspired by famous works of French literary existentialists: J.P.Sartre’s La Nausée (1939, Nausea), and Albert Camus’s L’Étranger (1942, The Stranger). Ideological formulations from periodicals, radio, and politicians’ speeches are depicted in snippets, as in modernist → collages. *e Clerical Republic also draws from official antisemitic propaganda: ‘[the] radical solution to the Jewish question in Slovakia, Jews were removed from public services […] the end of international → Jewish Bolshevism […] the Jew will always remain aJew’, etc. (Tatarka, 1948, pp.127, 132 and 135) → Slovak clerofascist jargon. OPEN ACCESS
HANDBOOK OF POLISH, CZECH AND SLOVAK HOLOCAUST FICTION 183 Jewish characters play an important role in the novel. After anti-Jewish laws are enacted, most of them remain outsiders in society, ‘people without afuture’ living in a‘bubble’ (p.125). Some resign themselves to their fate: the Klapovecs, for instance, an older married couple whose hotel and café are expropriated— or ‘aryanised’— by John Menkina, and who are happy to have asmall room in their former mansion. Or Edita Solani’s father who is astonemason, and who gives up his job when his shop is painted with tar. Other Jews try to save themselves. The old Jewish attorney Werner offers John Menkina alarge sum for his American passport, which he considers as aguarantee of freedom. The rich family of the former factory director Friedmann converts to Lutheranism. → conversion of Jews to Christians. Edita hopes to be rescued through afalse confirmation of baptism and marriage to Fraňo Lašut; see Rudolf Jašík’s → St.Elizabeth’s Square or Denisa Fulmeková’s → Doctor Mráz. She jokes with Fraňo about her large → Jewish nose, but eventually undergoes plastic surgery for fear of being found out. The narrator describes the result as a→ grotesque scene. Later, Edita, aformer student of medicine, moves to Bratislava. She works in apharmacy and is involved in the resistance. By contrast, Slovak Roman Catholic nationalists and officers of the → Hlinka Guard (the Slovak military Fascist organisation) proclaim their struggle against the Jews. In reality, they use their services and covet their property. CITED WORKS Tatarka, D. (1948). Farská republika. Martin: Matica slovenská. Olonovová, E. (1993). Poetika prózy Dominika Tatarky. Česká literatura, 39(3), pp.292–315. Patera, L. (1994). Tvorba Dominika Tatarky ve společenském aliterárním kontextu. Slovenské rozhľady, 1(1–2), pp.29–42. Petrík, V. (2013). Tatarkove autorské zásahy do románu Farská republika. In: I.Pospíšil and A.Zelenková (eds.). Dominik Tatarka vsouvislostech světové kultury. Brno: Česká asociace slavistů, pp.99–104. FURTHER REFERENCES Antošová, M. (2011). Tatarkovo dielo vkontexte existencializmu. Nitra: Univerzita Konštantína Filozofa. Bombíková, P. (2000). Nové formulovanie spisovateľa aspisovateľskej práce vrokoch 1946–1956: Prípad Dominika Tatarku. Slovenská literatura, 47(3), pp.100–118. Hudymač, M. (2005). Dominik Tatarka: Farská republika. Available at: http://pisacky.blogspot.com/2008/08/dominik-tatarka-farsk- -republika.html [Accessed: 4.04.2019]. Hamada, M. (1994). Tatarkova Farská republika asúčasnosť. In: J.Borguľová (ed.). Literatúra aSlovenské národne povstanie. Banská Bystrica: Literárne ahudobné múzeum vBanskej Bystrici, pp.47–52. Jančovič, I. (1996). Dominik Tatarka ajeho dielo vpremenách času: 1940–1956. Banská Bystrica: Metodické centrum. Liehm, A.J. (1970). *e Politics of Culture. New York: Grove Press. Števček, J. (1989). Dejiny slovenského románu. Bratislava: Tatran, pp.452–457. Višňovský, J. (2009). Život adielo Dominika Tatarku. Trnava: Univerzita sv.Cyrila aMetoda. Jiří Holý (1953), Professor of Czech Literature, Faculty of Arts, Charles University, Prague. OPEN ACCESS
184 SLOVO A SMYSL 34 THE INN (AUSTERIA) Author: Julian Stryjkowski First Published: 1966 Translations: German (Austeria, 1968; Die Osteria, 1969); English (*e Inn, 1971); Hungarian (Austeria, 1971); French (L’Auberge du vieux Tag, 1972); Hebrew (Austeria, 1979); Czech (Hostinec. Austeria, 2011). Film Adaptation: Austeria (Austeria), feature film, screenplay Tadeusz Konwicki, Jerzy Kawalerowicz and Julian Stryjkowski; film director Jerzy Kawalerowicz, premiered 28 March, 1983. About the Author: Julian Stryjkowski (1905–1996), born Pesach Jakob Stark, was acontroversial Polish-Jewish writer, playwright, and translator belonging to the ‘Jewish School’ in Polish postwar literature, known as achronicler of the Jewish fate. In this context his works may stand comparison with Bruno Schulz and Isaac Bashevis Singer. Born in Stryj, aprovincial town in Eastern Galicia (the Austrian partition of Poland, modern Ukraine) into afamily of Hasidic Jews, he grew up in a→ shtetl as the son of aJewish schoolteacher. Though he denied being of the Jewish faith, Stryjkowski was deeply influenced by the traditional and religious atmosphere of the Jewish shtetl, reconciling ‘his Polish, Jewish, Communist, and queer identities’ in his literary works (Hutchens, 2019, p.57). Stryjkowski started studying Hebrew and became acommitted follower of → Zionism. In 1932, after graduating with adoctorate in Polish Studies and Literature at Jan Kazimierz University in Lwów (Lviv, Lemberg), he found work as aPolish language teacher at agrammar school in Płock (Central Poland). He joined the de-legalised Communist Party of Western Ukraine in 1934, and was imprisoned in Lwów in 1935 for teaching Communist ideology. After his release in 1936 he moved to Warsaw to work as ajournalist and bookseller, and after the invasion of Poland (1939), escaped to Soviet occupied Lwów, where he worked for the propaganda newspaper Czerwony Sztandar. After the German occupation of Lwów (1941) he escaped to Kuybyshev, and attempted unsuccessfully to join the Polish II Corps commanded by General Władysław Anders. With the help of the Polish Communist writer Wanda Wasilewska, Stryjkowski was allowed to go to Moscow, where he worked for the weekly Wolna Europa organ of the Society of Polish Patriots, adopting the pen name Julian Stryjkowski, aname derived from his hometown, Stryj. In 1946 Stryjkowski returned to Poland, and in 1949–1952 headed the Polish Press Agency in Katowice as well as its office in Rome, but was forced to leave Italy following the publication of his critical anti-capitalist novel ARun to Fragalà (1951). In Poland he worked on the editorial board of the leading Polish literary monthly Twórczość, where he would continue to work until his retirement in 1978. In 1966 Stryjkowski quit the Polish United Workers’ Party in protest against the execution of Rudolf Slánský → Slánský trial and the Communist suppression of art, culture and science; he ‘converted from communism to Judaism’ (Kot, 1997, p.164). Unlike Leszek OPEN ACCESS
HANDBOOK OF POLISH, CZECH AND SLOVAK HOLOCAUST FICTION 185 Kołakowski and other Polish dissidents, Stryjkowski did not leave Poland. His literary works, published underground, were officially published again after 1978. Due to his controversial political past, Stryjkowski remained rather unknown in the West. His collection of short stories Silence, in which he openly declared his homosexuality, was published in 1993. Silence also provoked discussions on other themes, his Jewish heritage and his commitment to communism. These discussions established him as an important Polish-Jewish writer focusing on personal moral responsibility in times of physical and psychological threats— including the mass extermination—, themes he took up starting with his very first novel Voices in the Darkness (1956). Stryjkowski died 8 August 1996 in Warsaw, and was buried in Warsaw Jewish Cemetery on Okopowa Street. Further Important Publications: Głosy wciemności (1956, Voices in the Darkness; novel); Czarna róża (1962, The Black Rose; novel); Sen Azrila (1975, Asril’s Dream; novel); Przybysz zNarbony (1978, The Stranger from Narbonne; novel); Wielki strach (1980, The Great Fear; novel); Milczenie (1993, Silence; short stories). Content and Interpretation *e Inn, dedicated to Stryjkowski’s emancipated sister Maria, is ahaunting description of Jewish life in Eastern Galicia at the beginning of the 20th century and outbreak of World War II. Assimilation, emancipation, acculturation, and vanishing worlds are part of reflections on different aspects of Jewish/Polish → Polish/Jewish relations, Jewish/Austrian, and Jewish/Ukrainian relations of that time. The novel chronicles the gradual demise of Jewish life in the shtetl as aresult of various forces coming primarily from outside the community. The innkeeper Tag, similar to an apocryphal → Noah, offers sanctuary to bewildered and dispossessed people in his inn close to the Russian border. Indeed, the cast of characters represents awide range of religious, social, and political backgrounds: aUkrainian servant, aHungarian Husar, aPolish Catholic priest. While the → Hasids pray, dance and sing, others mourn, or try to find away out of the disaster to come. The catastrophe begins on the eve of World War Iwith aconfrontation on the village square between Jewish residents and invading Cossacks, anticipating the widespread death and devastation soon to come. Tag sets out to demand justice, with the attitude that ‘one must save what can be saved’ (Stryjkowski, 1972, p.86). The massacre of the Hasidic Jews during their ritual bathing in the river is aharbinger of the future destruction of the East European Jews. Piotr Szewc’s → Annihilation. It marks the end of acommunity organized on the basis of common traditions, values, and customs— alife characterized by unique charm and poetry. Stryjkowski’s novel is afitting and lasting monument of world culture and literature to alost world and amurdered civilization. It is regarded as ametaphor anticipating the slaughter and annihilation of the Holocaust to come. Main Topics and Problems Three of Stryjkowski’s most acclaimed novels: Voices in the Darkness, *e Inn and Azril’s Dream are referred to as his ‘Jewish trilology’ because of their ‘similarities in setting’ (in Galicia), ‘general tonality’, ‘Jewish themes’ as well as their ‘specific local and ethnic experience’ (Pizem-Karczag, 1983, p.89). Here ‘the problem of assimilation, OPEN ACCESS
186 SLOVO A SMYSL 34 acculturation and emancipation of the Jews were mainly touched’ (Kornacka-Sareło, 2016, p.168). In auniversal language of human struggle, suffering, and hope, these works commemorate the unique world of the Eastern European Jewish settlements destroyed by the Nazis. In focusing on the shtetl, Stryjkowski ‘sought to render the spirit of Yiddish by employing imperfect Polish’, stating that he regarded himself as aPolish writer and the Polish language as his true ‘homeland’ (Prokop-Janiec, 2010). But he also claimed to be aJewish writer (like Isaak Babel, Elie Wiesel or Primo Levi). In addition to its depictions of Jewish life, Stryjkowski’s postwar literature also deals with the Holocaust, albeit indirectly. In his historical novel *e Stranger from Narbonne, which is dedicated to the insurgents of the Warsaw ghetto, the Holocaust is universalized as aparable of mortal danger to the Jewish communities. In contrast, his Galician works point to ‘God’s responsibility for evil and the suffering of innocent people’ → God’s omnipotence, indicating aHasidic interpretation of suffering as aparticipation in an act ‘benefiting humankind’ and ‘restoring the world’ (ibid.). Stryjkowski’s trilogy also features stories about the old prophets, kings, and heroes of Israel. His prose combines ‘personal narration, techniques of oneiric literatures and polyphonic novels’, and merges ‘documentary prose with symbolism’ (ibid.). Struck by Stryjkowski’s *e Inn, the Polish filmmaker Jerzy Kawalerowicz once claimed he had made his metaphorical film with the same title in 1982 to commemorate the Polish-Jewish people and culture, and to give voice to their dreams and point of view as they faced the ultimate threat. CITED WORKS Stryjkowski, J. (1972). *e Inn. London: Barrie & Jenkins. Hutchens, J.J.B. (2019). Julian Stryjkowski: Polish, Jewish, queer. Canadian Slavonic Papers, 61(1), pp.57–80. Available at: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/00085006.2018.1552478?src=recsys&journalCode=rcsp20 [Accessed: 16.03.2020] Kornacka-Sareło, K. (2016). Where is the World of Ours? Assimilation, Acculturation and Emancipation Process of the Galician Jews in the Prose by Julian Stryjkowski (Pesach Jakob Stark). In: W. Szczerbiński, K. Kornacka-Sareło (eds.). Jews in Eastern Europe: Ways of Assimilation. Cambridge: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, pp.166–184. Kot, W. (1997). Julian Stryjkowski. Poznań: Dom Wydawniczy ‘Rebis’. Pizem-Karczag, I. (1983). The Jewish Trilogy of Julian Stryjkowski. *e Polish Review, 4(28), pp.89–97. Prokop-Janiec, E. (2010). Stryjkowski, Julian. In: *e Yivo Encyclopedia of Jews in Eastern Europe. October 2010, 21. Available at: https://yivoencyclopedia.org/article.aspx/ Stryjkowski_Julian [Accessed: 16. 03. 2020] FURTHER REFERENCES Adamczyk-Garbowska, M., Zurek S.J., Polonsky, A., Prokop-Janiec, E. (2015). Jewish Writing in Poland. Polin: Studies in Polish Jewry, 28. Liverpool: Liverpool University Press. Adamczyk-Garbowska, M., Polonsky, A. (2004). Polish-Jewish Literature: An Outline. In: Cornis-Pope, M., Neubauer, J. (eds.). History of the Literary Cultures of East Central Europe: Junctures and Disjunctures in the 19th and 20th Centuries. Vol.1. Amsterdam, Philadelphia: John Benjamins Publishing Company, pp.435–440. Bauman, Z. (1996). Assimilation into Exile: The Jew as aPolish Writer. Poetics Today, 17(4), pp.569–597. Klose-Henrichs, M. (2010). Literarische Deutungen jüdischer Existenz im Werke Julian Stryjkowskis. Bochum: Ruhr-Universität Bochum. Pacławski, J. (1999). Powieści ieseje JuliOPEN ACCESS
HANDBOOK OF POLISH, CZECH AND SLOVAK HOLOCAUST FICTION 187 ana Stryjkowskiego. Kielce: Wyższa Szkoła Pedagogiczna im. Jana Kochanowskiego. Piekarski,I. (2008). Fałszywy mesjasz. Ojednym toposie żydowskim wtwórczości Juliana Stryjkowskiego. Pamiętnik Literacki, 2, pp.51–88. Available at: https://rcin.org.pl/dlibra/show-content/publication/ edition/63129?id=63129 [Accessed: 16.03.2020] Philipps, U. (1996). Obituary: Julian Stryjkowski. Independent, 17.8.1996. Available at: https://www.independent.co.uk/news/obituaries/obituaryjulianstryjkowski-1310072.html [Accessed: 16.03.2020] Pizem-Karczag, I. (1983). The Jewish Trilogy of Julian Stryjkowski. *e Polish Review, 28(4), pp.89–97. Prokop-Janiec, E. (1995). Stryjkowski. Sny ijawa. Ruch Literacki, 36(5), pp.647–662. Safran, G. (2000). Dancing with Death and Salvaging Jewish Culture in Austeria and The Dybbuk. Slavic Review, 59(4), pp.761–781. Sobolewska, A. (1996). Dwa moralitety Juliana Stryjkowskiego. In: Brodzka, A., Burska, W. (eds.). Sporne postacie literatury polskiej. Kontynuacje. Warszawa: IBL, pp.67–87. Szewc, P. (1991). Ocalony na Wschodzie. ZJulianem Stryjkowskim rozmawia Piotr Szewc. Montricher: Noir sur Blanc. Szewc, P. (1997). Żydzi iPolacy wprozie Juliana Stryjkowskiego. Polonistyka, 50(4), p.234–236. Zanthier, A. (2000). Julian Stryjkowski und Edgar Hilsenrath: Zur Identität jüdischer Schri+steller nach 1945. Essen: Die Blaue Eule. Hans-Christian Trepte (1950), Dr., Doc., retired professor, scholar of West Slavonic Studies at Leipzig University, Institut für Slavistik. Research work on Literatures and Cultures of Central Europe, translator. CONFESSION (SPOWIEDŻ) Author: Calek Perechodnik First Published: 1993; corrected edition 1995; first complete edition 2004. Translations: Hebrew (ha-Ta<id he-atsuv shel ha tiud: yoman mahbo, 1993); French (Suis-je un meurtrier?, 1995); English (Am IaMurderer? Testament of aJewish Ghe%o Policeman, 1996); German (Bin ich ein Mörder? Das Testament eines jüdischen Ghe%oPolizisten, 1997); Italian (Sono un assasino? Autodifensa di un polizio%o ebreo, 1996). Musical Adaptation: Am IaMurderer? ACantata for Bass Voice, Flute, Piccolo, Clarinet, Bass Clarinet, Violin, Viola, Cello and Piano; composed by Sylvia Glickman, poetry by Frank Fox, 1999. About the Author: Calel (Calek) Perechodnik (1916–1944) was born to aprosperous Jewish family. Together with his older brother, Pejsach, he joined the right-wing Zionist group Bojtar. The introduction of numerus clausus at the Warsaw University in 1934 drastically limited the number of Jewish students who could enrol, which is why Perechodnik transferred to University of Toulouse, France, where he earned amaster’s degree in agronomy. In 1938, he married Anna Nusfeld, co-owner of the cinema Oasis in Otwock near Warsaw, and started running abuilding materials warehouse with his uncle. After the outbreak of the war, Perechodnik together with his father, uncle, and brother left Otwock for Słonim in the east of Poland. He returned as early as October 1939, and in February 1941 joined the Jewish Ghetto Police, which was OPEN ACCESS