Jaworzno. Niewidoczność

The article concerns the literary representations of the Polish communist labor camp in Jaworzno (1945–1956), especially Seweryna Szmaglewska’s short story Amnestia zastukała do bram (1956, Amnesty knocked at the gates), Kazimierz Koźniewski’s novel Bunt w więzieniu (1968, Rebellion in the prisonhouse), and Sławomir Mrożek’s short story Jaworzno (1985). The object of the paper is also the problem of ideological involvement of Polish literature and writers (especially during the Stalinist period), the reasons for “overlooking” by them (and by Polish society) the obvious manifestations of communist terror. His alleged “invisibility” was analogous to the “invisibility” of crimes committed by the Nazis, allegedly unnoticed by the Third Reich citizens. Among Polish writers this analogy between Nazism and communism was exposed by Mrożek, the similarities between both totalitarianisms were perceived also by Szmaglewska and Czesław Miłosz.

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