Anti-Semitic narratives in literature inspired by March 1968

The literary output inspired by the anti-Jewish campaign of late April and early March 1968 can be divided into two categories. The first one encompasses anonymous works spread by “unknown individuals” at the University of Warsaw. They were believed to have been written by officials working for the Ministry of the Interior or the Warsaw Committee of the Polish United Workers’ Party. These texts of dubious artistic quality often exploited rhetorical terms typical for the regime propaganda in 1968, for example emphasising the Jewish descent of the organisers of student protests:

 

Robotnik z chłopem ciężko pracują

Te urwipołcie Polskę rujnują.

Polskę rujnują – blade ich lica,

Ich ideałem zbój – Jasienica.

 

Tych kilku Mońków z wyższych uczelni,

Co w naszym kraju są tak bezczelni.

Niechże Ben Gurion w kibuce wsadzi,

Pod sam Tel-Awiw. Będziemy radzi.

(“Do niektórych studentów,” Krytyka Polityczna 1989, no. 28–29, p. 48)

 

Some texts used the style and language widely known from anti-Semitic jokes, whose protagonists would speak “broken Polish” with numerous Yiddish inserts:

 

Kulturalne Apel!

Do te polskie szajgece studenty!

Uś! jak ja sze ide cieszyć, że ten student jest takie mundre. Idzie wiosna. Po co ten Kowalskie sze ma uczyć. Ja idę Was zapraszać do ten piękne Izrael. Co wam idzie szkodzić, że nie będziecie takie mundre jak chce ten wasz Gomulkie. Jak wi będziecie mocne w biceps to ja mam dla was dobre posade w Kibuces pod tytułem: „Grojse Kojdym” i „Żadne Mojre”.

Szalom! Mosze Dajan

(Krytyka Polityczna 1989, no. 28–29, p. 48)

 

The second, much broader category are the novels written after the March events, for instance Stanisław Ryszard Dobrowolski’s Głupia sprawa (1969). Despite its mediocre literary value, the book became a true bestseller. It featured anti-Jewish slogans used by the state propaganda during the anti-Zionist campaign, and exploited the stereotype of good (poor proletarians) and bad (wealthy officials, intelligentsia) Jews.

One of the writers who incorporated anti-Semitic and anti-Israeli themes into his works was Roman Bratny. In 1969, he published Dawid, syn Henryka, where he drew comparisons between the treatment of Palestinians by the Israeli army and the activities of the SS during the Holocaust. Bratny would later continue to use anti-Semitic rhetoric in his literary output. In Trzy w linii prostej (1981), for example, he depicted a Jewish supporter of Stalinism and agent of the Security Service, making him a symbol of all the evils of the world. The works included in the volume Twarde ojczyzny (1986) also featured echoes of the March propaganda and anti-Israeli rhetoric. In his short story Abu Null, Bratny once again depicted the two sides of the Arab-Israeli conflict as tormentors (Jews) and victims (Palestinians).

Bibliography

1. Molisak A., “Kilka uwag o odmianach „marcowych” narracji,” [in] (Nie)ciekawa epoka? Literatura i PRL, ed. H. Gosk, Warsaw 2008, pp. 275–288.
2. Stasiński P., “Estetyka „wydarzeń”,” Res Publica 1988, no. 4.
3. Buryła S., “Literackie aberracje z Marca’68,” [in] Honor, Bóg, Ojczyzna, eds. M. Janion, M. Rudaś-Grodzka, D. Krawczyńska, Warsaw 2009.
4. “Grojse odezwe apele,” Kwartalnik Polityczny 1989, excerpt from no. 28–29.