Polish Jews in the Soviet Union (1939–1959)

In a time of international crisis, a small group of Polish Communist intellectuals on Soviet territory, with approval from the Stalinist government, harnessed the national myths of a people faced with total destruction in the name of fascist Aryan supremacy. These intellectuals, ethnic Poles and Polish Jews, rejected, revitalized, or revolutionized old national myths and created a new mythology. They coordinated their efforts closely with the anti-Hitlerite National Front Strategy adopted by the Comintern following the German invasion of the Soviet Union in June, 1941. They sincerely, albeit naïvely, believed that their creation manifestly assured the Poles of their national identity. They also believed that the new mythology promised not only the survival of an honorable people but also the rebirth of their state in a brighter future in solidarity with fellow Slavs, and ultimately with the Stalinist Soviet state which they admired.

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SPRAWA ROSYJSKA W LITERATURZE POLSKIEJ W IZRAELU. Rekonesans

Rusycystyczne Studia Literaturoznawcze ◽

10.31261/rsl.2017.27.11 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 27 ◽

pp. 140-150

Author(s):

Sławomir Jacek Żurek

Keyword(s):

Soviet Union ◽

The Other ◽

Literary Works ◽

Polish Literature ◽

The Soviet Union ◽

Polish Jews ◽

Soviet Russia ◽

The One

The Russian problem in Polish literature in Israel is first of all concerned with experiences of the writers. The Soviet Russia was on the one hand a place of torment and torture, but on the other it was a chance for may Polish Jews (significant Polish-Israeli writers) to survive. According to the author the writers were either ideological communists, camp prisoners or refugees. The time they spent in the Soviet Union was an inspiration for their literary works, and Russia — paradoxically — was a source of great fascination.

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Singing Their Way Home

Polin: Studies in Polish Jewry Volume 32 ◽

10.3828/liverpool/9781906764739.003.0023 ◽

2020 ◽

pp. 411-428

Author(s):

Eliyana R. Adler

Keyword(s):

Soviet Union ◽

Jewish Population ◽

Human Spirit ◽

The Soviet Union ◽

The Holocaust ◽

The Face ◽

Polish Jews ◽

The Many ◽

Spiritual Resistance ◽

The Way

This chapter analyzes the way wartime experiences were reflected in the songs of Polish Jews who escaped the Holocaust by fleeing to the Soviet Union. It introduces both the contours of the controversy and the broad outlines of what the Polish Jews went through during the war years. It also looks into the research about partisans and ghetto fighters that far outweighs their significance and their percentage of the Jewish population in Europe. The chapter investigates the hegemony of armed resistance by introducing the idea of “spiritual resistance,” which encompassed explicitly religious and other actions that raised the human spirit in the face of the Nazi effort to destroy it. It identifies singing as one of the many phenomena to describe spiritual resistance, which is considered an act that could have no possible effect on the war and yet allowed its victims to find the strength to continue living.

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