Zofia Kossak-Szczucka
Zofia Kossak-Szczucka , later Zofia Kossak-Szatkowska , b. Kossak (born August 10, 1889 in Kośmin, Congress Poland (today Gmina Żyrzyn ), † April 9, 1968 in Bielsko-Biała ), was a Polish writer, resistance fighter and initiator of the Żegota .
life and work
She was the daughter of Tadeusz Kossak, twin brother of the painter Wojciech Kossak , and granddaughter of Juliusz Kossak , who was also a painter. In most publications, 1890 is given as the year of your birth, but the latest research gives 1889 as the year of birth. She spent her childhood and youth in Russian-dominated eastern Poland , from 1906 she lived and worked as governess in Warsaw , then studied at the art academy there , and later at the art academy in Geneva . In 1915 she married Stefan Szczucki and moved with him back to Volhynia , where she experienced the peasant uprisings and the Polish-Soviet war . In 1921 she widowed and in 1923 moved to Górki Wielkie in the Polish part of Cieszyn Silesia , where she married her second husband Zygmunt Szatkowski in 1925. In her works she discovered the Silesian landscape for Polish readers (folklore of the Teschen Wallachians and the Silesian Gorals , as well as the figure of Ondraszek - actually from the Moravian-Lachian language area ). In 1932 she received the Literature Prize of the Silesian Voivodeship and in 1936 the golden laurel wreath of the Polish Literature Academy ( Złoty Wawrzyn Polskiej Akademii Literatury ).
She experienced the beginning and the first years of the Second World War in Warsaw, where she was conspiratorial and charitable. She was at the head of the Catholic underground organization Front Odrodzenia Polski (Front for the Rebirth of Poland) and in this capacity she published a protest against the Holocaust in August 1942, which was based mainly on information from Jan Karski . The protest was recorded on microfilm compiled by the Home Army's Office of Information and Propaganda (BIP) to inform the English about the situation of the Jews. The protest ended with the words:
“We don't want to be like Pilate. We do not intend to actively oppose the German murderers; we have no chance of defeating them or saving anyone. But we protest from the bottom of our hearts, from hearts that are filled with compassion, disgust and horror. We are commanded by God to protest - God who forbade us to kill. Our Christian conscience requires it of us. Every creature that calls itself human has a right to charity. The blood of the helpless calls on the heavens for punishment. Whoever does not support this protest is not a Catholic. "
She was the initiator of the Żegota , an organization that saved around 75,000 Jews from extermination. The leading activist in Kossak's "Konrad Żegota Committee" was the future Polish Foreign Minister Władysław Bartoszewski , who was introduced to her in 1942 by Jan Karski. She was in contact with the secret, militant Catholic organization Unia and wrote for the underground newspaper Polska żyje ( Poland Lives ). In 1943 she was arrested and deported to the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp, after which she was interned in the Warsaw women's prison “Serbia” . She was released in 1944 and took part in the Warsaw Uprising .
After the end of the war, a communist government was formed under Soviet sovereignty. In June 1945 Zofia Kossak was summoned by the new Polish Minister of the Interior, Jakub Berman , of Jewish descent. He urged her to leave the country, as the Bierut regime began to persecute the non-communist Polish resistance after the war. Through his brother Adolf Berman he knew what Zofia had done to save the lives of numerous Jews. So he saved her life. Zofia fled to the west. In 1945 she worked in the Polish Red Cross Mission in London, then she stayed in England in Cornwall for 12 years .
In 1957 she returned to Poland and published mainly in the Catholic press. In 1964 she signed the so-called Letter 34 ( list 34 ), a protest letter by Antoni Słonimski on the subject of freedom of speech .
Zofia Kossak died on April 9, 1968 in Bielsko-Biała and was buried in Górki Wielkie .
Zofia Kossak's daughter Anna Szatkowska lived in Switzerland; she has published a book about her mother's participation in the Warsaw Uprising of 1944.
Honors
- Golden Laurel of the Polish Academy of Literature
- Zofia Kossak belonged to the Order of Lazarus and was honored with the Great Cross of Honor and Recognition.
- Order of Polonia Restituta (Officer)
- Zofia Kossak was honored as "Righteous Among the Nations" by the Yad Vashem Memorial for the Victims of the Holocaust , located in Jerusalem .
- In 2009 she and two other women were honored with a commemorative coin by the National Bank of Poland (see Żegota ).
Works
In the Polish original:
| Beatum scelus (1924) | Beatyfikacja Skargi | Bez oręża (1937) | Błogosławiona wina | Błogosławiony Jan Sarkander ze Skoczowa |
| Bursztyny | Chrześcijańskie posłannictwo Polski | Dzień dzisiejszy (1931) | Dziedzictwo | Gość oczekiwany |
| Gród nad jeziorem | Kielich krwi - obrazek sceniczny w dwóch aktach | Kłopoty Kacperka góreckiego skrzata (1924) | Król trędowaty (1937) | Krzyżowcy - powieść (1935) |
| Ku swoim (1932) | Legnickie pole (1930, German Die Wahlstatt von Liegnitz translation OF Battaglii, Kösel & Pustet 1931) | Well drodze | Well Śląsku | Nieznany kraj - wybór opowiadań (1932) |
| Ognisty wóz | Pątniczym szlakiem. Wrażenia z pielgrzymki (1933) | Pod lipą | Pożoga (powieść). Wspomnienia z Wołynia 1917-1919 (1922) | Prometeusz i garncarz |
| Przygody Kacperka, góreckiego skrzata | Przymierze (1952) | Purpurowy szlak | Puszkarz Orbano | Rewindykacja polskości na Kresach |
| Rok polski: obyczaj i wiara | SOS ...! | Skarb Śląski | Suknia Dejaniry | Szaleńcy Boży (1929) |
| Szukajcie przyjaciół - powieść dla młodzieży (1933) | Topsy i Lupus (1931) | Trembowla | Troy północy (razem z Zygmuntem Szatkowskim) | W Polsce Podziemnej: wybrane pisma dotyczące lat 1939–1944 |
| Varna | Wielcy i mali (1927) | Z dziejów Śląska | Z miłości (1925) | Z otchłani: wspomnienia z lagru |
| Złota wolność (1928) |
In French translation:
- Du Fond de l'Abime, Seigneur ... , Editions Albin Michel (1951) (about her experiences in Auschwitz)
Later German translations:
- At the first star of the night, 16 Christmas Tales from Poland (the last text is by Zofia Kossak), Evangelische Verlagsanstalt, Berlin 1976
- Der Bund , Union Verlag, Berlin 1958
- The hero without a weapon , Otto Verlag, Olten 1949
- Die Kreuzfahrer , Vol. 1 and 2, Union Verlag, Berlin 1962
- Frommer Frevel , Otto Walter Verlag, Olten 1947
- God's fools , St. Benno Verlag, Leipzig 1960
Web links
- Literature by and about Zofia Kossak-Szczucka in the catalog of the German National Library
- Zofia Kossak-Szczucka's Holocaust Protest ( Memento from August 17, 2010 in the Internet Archive ) (Wikisource, Polish)
- Museum Zofii Kossak-Szatkowskas in Górki Wielkie (Polish) ( Memento from January 15, 2010 in the Internet Archive )
- Zofia Kossak-Szczucka - Personal Information (Polish) ( Memento from February 14, 2008 in the Internet Archive )
Footnotes
- ^ Zofia Kossak's birth certificate found ( Memento from September 27, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) (Polish).
- ↑ a b La maison brulée (German: The burned house ). A sixteen year old volunteer in the Warsaw Uprising. Les Éditions Noir sur Blanc, Lausanne 2005, ISBN 978-2-88250-202-5 (French).
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Kossak-Szczucka, Zofia |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Kossak-Szatkowska, Zofia; Kossak, Zofia (maiden name) |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | Polish writer and resistance fighter |
| DATE OF BIRTH | August 10, 1889 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Kośmin, Gmina Żyrzyn |
| DATE OF DEATH | April 9, 1968 |
| Place of death | Bielsko-Biała |