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World War II through Polish Eyes

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World War II Through Polish Eyes
By
M.B. Szonert

This powerful story depicts the gehenna of one Polish family during the greatest human catastrophe in Poland's history. Young Danuta and her family struggles through the invasion of Poland, the defense of Warsaw, and the German occupation. They suffer tragic losses in Katyñ, Siberia, Auschwitz and dozens of other concentration camps, in Gestapo and NKVD prisons, on Monte Cassino, in the Warsaw Uprising, and on the Western front. Danuta loses her husband and her father but thanks to the tenacious solidarity of the Polish people she survives the war with two small children. She later tries to begin a new life, remarries in the 50ties, and immigrates to the United States.

The book is easy to read thanks to many dialogs and vivid images. What is striking in this story is the attitude of the Polish women - mothers, daughters, and wives. For example, 19-year old Danuta writes to the Auschwitz commander asking him to show a photograph of her newly born son "Jędruś" to her husband - an Auschwitz prisoner. In a humanitarian flash, the commander actually releases Danuta's husband from the death camp. It reminds me of my own story when my own photograph (my nickname is also "Jędruś") saved the life of my father when he was called to the infamous Pavilion Number 11 in the same concentration camp. Danuta continues her crusade and later fights with the Gestapo to recover the body of her husband, and with NKVD to save her father and brother. Although the women were wise and prudent in those difficult times, the men were often too reckless and were dying unnecessarily.

This work is not only a fascinating story but also a history book. Each episode from Danuta's dramatic life is told in the larger, historical context. Presented with great diligence to assure a balanced approach to difficult issues, the historical context is well annotated and illustrated with documents and photographs. Written with a keen eye and thoroughness, this valuable work brings to light the enormity of the genocide committed on the Polish nation during WWII.
Prof. Andrew Targowski
WESTERN MICHIGAN UNIVERSITY

The novel is a spellbinding portrait of a young girl, Danuta, and her family's journey from peacetime Poland to the German and subsequent Soviet occupation. The author provides a balanced blend of historical background along with intense emotional drama. One can sense the intensity of the hardships, suffering and periods of joy and triumphant over ultimate terror, dishevel and human tragedy. Danuta's extreme resourcefulness, perseverance and wit against the German and Soviet occupants allow her and her family to survive eventhough impending danger is always omnipresent. This true account of Danuta's life expounds on actual events such as random transports to concentration camps, Katyn massacre, indiscriminate shootings and beatings, starvation, ect.. The story line includes a microcosm of the brutalities and cruelties exacted upon the Polish population during World War II. This true story is supported with annotations with a bibliography of historical references. The reality of Danuta's life is also supported with copies of letters written by her husband from Auschwitz prison and other documents to further exemplify the harsh and abominable conditions of life in wartime Poland. The story continually returns to an elderly Danuta who is instructing her young grandson on the historical background of Poland's barbaric occupation centered on the conspiracy of the German-Soviet agreements and subsequent betrayal between the two dictators. Poland becomes a battle ground in the quest for power while Polish resistance, including members of Danuta's family, struggles to resist German and Soviet oppression. The apprehension and tension and hope for the end of the German occupation results in the subjugation of Poland by the Soviet apparatus. Danuta's family must adjust to the Soviet regime change which proves to be a desperate struggle to resist total subjugation of Poland. This novel is a recommended reading to better comprehend the human tragedy of Poles during World War II as seen through the eyes of young Danuta.

When Hitler swallowed Austria and Czechoslovakia, he got APPROVALS from Britain and France. Poland was the first to resist him - and that is how World War II has started. This is known. The tragic fate of some 6 millions of Polish citizens during WWII is known too. Some 800 years earlier the Kings of Poland granted special priviledges to Jews so as to attract them to Poland and also save them from persecutions elsewhere. Hitler ended 800 years of coexistence of Christian Poles with Poles of Mosesian religous denomination (this is how Polish Jews were known inside Poland) by killing nearly all members of the latter group.

Less is known here in the United States about the sufferings of
non-Jewish citizens of Poland. VERY LITTLE is known about the diabolic JOINT plot of Hitler and Stalin to erase Poland and all its citizens from the surface of the earth. From a historical perspective, this book about Danuta and her life journey provides a wealth of important facts from first hand experience. Stories told me by my father Ludomir Boncza-Brzostowski confirm elements of the story of Danuta, also from first hand experience. He was among those who at the end of Warsaw 1944 Uprising got to the east side of Vistula so as not to surrender to the Nazis; as described in the book, most of those trying to do so were killed by the Nazi artillery. The command of the Polish Army on the Soviet side was taken away from Gen. Zygmunt Berling by Stalin - precisely because Berling tried to help the Uprising. As vividly desribed in the book, Stalin wanted Warsaw destroyed by Nazi hands.

However, the above description of the book might give a totally false impression ! This is also a FASCINATING book about love and atrocity, friendship and war, adversity and solidarity. Do not be fooled by the awkward book title.

This book tells the incredibly true story of a Polish-American woman whose life encompassed most of the major events of Poland in World War II: the Katyn Massacre of Polish leaders by the Soviets; the random abduction of Poles on the streets of Warsaw for deportation to the Nazi concentration camp at Oswiecim (Auschwitz); the Polish underground; the Warasw Uprising (the larger, longer, and lesser known uprising--not to be confused with the earlier Warsaw Ghetto Uprising) and the resultant systematic destruction of the city; and the atrocities of the Soviet "liberation."
Based on the accounts of the protgaonist, the story is compellingly told, with only a few awkwardly written coversations between her and her grandson (which sound more like history lectures than believable dialog), and an occasional mistake with the author's English (my belief is that the author has learned English as a second language). These are minor, technical problems, though, and should not keep anyone from reading this important saga of one family's struggles for survival during those horrific times. The story of Poland's occupation, and its heroic struggle against annihilatio from both their Nazi enemies and their so-called Soviet allies is little known in the West. This book helps to give the reader a true feeling (with a human face)for what went on during one of the worst times in human history.

This work describes the events surrounding WWII through the eyes of specifically-named Polish individuals who experienced the events, or talked with those who did. It includes an extensive bibliography for further study.

The taking of a tiny disputed border area of Zaolza (Trans-Olza, of Cieszyn: Teschen), during the 1938 Nazi-sponsored dismemberment of Czechoslovakia, has at times been misrepresented as a Polish aggressive act. In contrast, Szonert understands this event as follows: "His (Beck's) defenders argue that his annexation of Zaolzie was aimed at the Munich policy and Germany's increasing power rather than at Czechoslovakia as such. If not Poland, then Germany would take over Zaolzie with its sizable Polish population and strategic industrial base with the largest steel mill in Europe. Colonel Beck makes this bold move to prevent the German penetration of Poland's southern borders vital to Polish defense." (p. 25).

The events up to the 1939 German attack included German fifth-column activities. These are well described. (e. g., p. 70). The brutalities of the German occupation are featured. There is an extensive account of a Polish prisoner at Auschwitz. Projected to live no more than 3 months, he survived. In time, he was released.

Holocaust-uniqueness proponents have argued that Polish prisoners could sometimes be released from Nazi custody, but Jews never. [Actually, some Jews were released--such as the 1,500 in the Kastner-Eichmann deal.] Szonert's data (p. 258) makes it obvious that, while it is true that Polish prisoners could be released, this also was very exceptional. Of several tens of thousands of prisoners at Auschwitz in 1941, some 300 were released, amounting to less than one percent.

Szonert puts the Nazi system in perspective, going beyond the usual Judeocentric approach. She comments: "Between 1939 and 1945, the Nazis built or set up about nine thousand concentration camps including main camps and their auxiliaries. It is estimated that about 18 million people from 30 nations went through these concentration camps." (p. 271).

Throughout this book, seldom-mentioned information is included. For instance, Szonert cites sources that estimate that the Germans employed the same number of soldiers to crush the Warsaw Uprising of 1944 as they had in Rommel's North Africa Campaign of 1941-1943. (p. 341).

Szonert's work also includes brief flashbacks to earlier times in Polish history. The szlachta, or Polish nobility, ranged from magnates that owned vast estates and even their own armies, down to petty gentry that worked the land like the peasantry. The szlachta at times reached the unheard-of 15% of the Polish population--the largest noble class in any country at the time. (p. 324).

This is the second book that I have read by Maria Szonert. Her other book, Null and Void was written after WW II Through Polish Eyes. To have done credit to Ms. Szonert, I should have read Null and Void second, because reading her newer work shows dramatically how she has grown as a writer in 6 years. I feel a bit awkward writing a review of this book after writing one about her subsequent book because now that review seems incomplete.

Null and Void is a tremendous contribution to the Polish WW II experience and the post war experience bringing to light the suffering of Polish AK members at the hands of their own country. This is not something that has been written about widely and her thesis of the subject of her book being between two imperialist powers stood as a powerful metaphor for Poland and its history.

WW II Through Polish Eyes is a different kind of contribution. It is the story of Danuta, her family and their live before the war and during the war. It is the story of an ordinary woman; not a privileged woman but an ordinary one and the extraordinary experiences during this time in history. There are not many books written in English on this subject, especially in recounting what it was like to live from day to day in this turmoil and with constant terror. This is among the handful of books that fills that gap. It is one thing to read about the WW II experience and narrative from the standpoint of a historical or military work; it is altogether a more interesting one to read how people experienced it and coped from reading about the intimate details of that day to day coping. It expands the narrative in a rich way. Bravo to Ms. Szobert for adding this and helping to put a very human face on WW II in Poland.

Ms. Szonert is successful in making us truly engage with this delightful woman, Danuta who I am sure was somehow related, by blood or marriage to Ms. Szonert. The smallest facets about Danuta are detailed in the book, and I cannot imagine that they would have been shared with Ms. Szonert if there was not some relationship there. Danuta was an enchanting woman and I took great pleasure in "getting to know her."

There are a few observations that I have about this book. First, the use of the present tense did not really work for me. I'm not sure whether her editors suggested it to increase a sense of immediacy, but I found it a bit ungainly to read, as opposed to a more conventional past tense.

There are also a number of places which I thought needed editing for sentences to be re-worked because they were a bit awkward. E.g. "Alek pulls out from his infinite pocket a white handkerchief, nearly the size of a tablecloth". Infinite is an odd word to use there, but aside from that, the sentence would have been smoother if written: Alek pulled a table sized handkerchief from his pocket. I'm not sure if the book had the benefit of a professional English or American editor but it would have helped immensely for one to have had a go at the manuscript. Sentences like this are easily re-worked.

Which brings me back to Null and Void, in which I didn't stumble on any such sentences - a much better written and gripping book. Both are very worthy efforts and it was exciting for me personally to compare the two and see the growth of a very, very good writer.