Polish culture during World War II
Encyclopedia
Polish culture during World War II
was suppressed by the occupying powers of Nazi Germany
and the Soviet Union
, both of whom were hostile to Poland
's people
and cultural heritage. Policies aimed at cultural genocide
resulted in the deaths of thousands of scholars and artists, and the theft and destruction of innumerable cultural artifacts. The "maltreatment of the Poles was one of many ways in which the Nazi and Soviet regimes had grown to resemble one another", wrote British historian Niall Ferguson
.
The occupiers looted and destroyed much of Poland's cultural and historical heritage, while persecuting and murdering members of the Polish cultural elite
. Most Polish schools
were closed, and those that remained open saw their curricula
altered significantly.
Nevertheless, underground organizations and individuals – in particular the Polish Underground State – saved much of Poland's most valuable cultural treasures, and worked to salvage as many cultural institutions and artifacts as possible. The Catholic Church and wealthy individuals contributed to the survival of some artists and their works. Despite severe retribution by the Nazis and Soviets, Polish underground cultural activities, including publications, concerts, live theater, education, and academic research, continued throughout the war.
nation and throughout the 18th century remained partitioned
by degrees between Prussian, Austrian and Russian empires. Not until the end of World War I was independence restored
and the nation reunited, although the drawing of boundary lines was, of necessity, a contentious issue
. Independent Poland lasted for only 21 years before it was again attacked and divided among foreign powers.
On 1 September 1939, Germany invaded Poland, initiating World War II
, and on 17 September, pursuant to the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact
, Poland was invaded by the Soviet Union
. Subsequently Poland was partitioned again – between these two powers – and remained under their occupation for most of the war. By 1 October, Germany and the Soviet Union had completely overrun Poland, although the Polish government never formally surrendered, and the Polish Underground State, subordinate to the Polish government-in-exile, was soon formed. On 8 October, Nazi Germany annexed the western areas of pre-war Poland
and, in the remainder of the occupied area, established the General Government
. The Soviet Union had to temporarily give up the territorial gains it made in 1939 due to the German invasion of the Soviet Union
, but permanently re-annexed them after winning them back in mid-1944. Over the course of the war, Poland lost over 20% of its pre-war population amid an occupation that marked the end of the Second Polish Republic
.
. The basic policy was outlined by the Berlin Office of Racial Policy
in a document titled Concerning the Treatment of the Inhabitants of the Former Polish Territories, from a Racial-Political Standpoint. Slavic people living east of the pre-war German border were to be Germanized, enslaved
or eradicated, depending on whether they lived in the territories directly annexed into the German state or in the General Government
.
Much of the German policy on Polish culture was formulated during a meeting between the governor of the General Government, Hans Frank
, and Nazi Minister of Propaganda Joseph Goebbels
, at Łódź on 31 October 1939. Goebbels declared that "The Polish nation is not worthy to be called a cultured nation". He and Frank agreed that opportunities for the Poles to experience their culture should be severely restricted: no theaters, cinemas or cabarets; no access to radio or press; and no education. Frank suggested that the Poles should periodically be shown films highlighting the achievements of the Third Reich and should eventually be addressed only by megaphone
. During the following weeks Polish schools beyond middle vocational levels were closed, as were theaters and many other cultural institutions. The only Polish-language
newspaper published in occupied Poland was also closed, and the arrests of Polish intellectuals began.
In March 1940, all cultural activities came under the control of the General Government's Department of People's Education and Propaganda (Abteilung für Volksaufklärung und Propaganda), whose name was changed a year later to the "Chief Propaganda Department" (Hauptabteilung Propaganda). Further directives issued in the spring and early summer reflected policies that had been outlined by Frank and Goebbels during the previous autumn. One of the Department's earliest decrees prohibited the organization of all but the most "primitive" of cultural activities without the Department's prior approval. Spectacles of "low quality", including those of an erotic or pornographic nature, were however an exception—those were to be popularized to appease the population and to show the world the "real" Polish culture as well as to create the impression that Germany was not preventing Poles from expressing themselves. German propaganda specialists invited critics from neutral countries to specially organized "Polish" performances that were specifically designed to be boring or pornographic, and presented them as typical Polish cultural activities. Polish-German cooperation in cultural matters, such as joint public performances, was strictly prohibited. Meanwhile, a compulsory registration scheme for writers and artists was introduced in August 1940. Then, in October, the printing of new Polish-language books was prohibited; existing titles were censored, and often confiscated and withdrawn.
In 1941, German policy evolved further, calling for the complete destruction of the Polish people
, whom the Nazis regarded as "subhuman" (Untermensch
en). Within ten to twenty years, the Polish territories under German occupation were to be entirely cleared of ethnic Poles and settled by German colonists
.
The policy was relaxed somewhat in the final years of occupation (1943–44), in view of German military defeats and the approaching Eastern Front. The Germans hoped that a more lenient cultural policy would lessen unrest and weaken the Polish Resistance. Poles were allowed back into those museums that now supported German propaganda and indoctrination, such as the newly created Chopin museum, which emphasized the composer's invented German roots. Restrictions on education, theater and music performances were eased.
Given that the Second Polish Republic
was a multicultural state, German policies and propaganda also sought to create and encourage conflicts between ethnic groups, fueling tension between Poles and Jews, and between Poles and Ukrainians. In Łódź, the Germans forced Jews to help destroy a monument to a Polish hero, Tadeusz Kościuszko
, and filmed them committing the act. Soon afterward, the Germans set fire to a Jewish synagogue
and filmed Polish bystanders, portraying them in propaganda releases as a "vengeful mob." This divisive policy was reflected in the Germans' decision to destroy Polish education, while at the same time, showing relative tolerance toward the Ukrainian school system. As the high-ranking Nazi official
Erich Koch
explained, "We must do everything possible so that when a Pole meets a Ukrainian, he will be willing to kill the Ukrainian and conversely, the Ukrainian will be willing to kill the Pole."
, Einsatzgruppen
units, who were responsible for art, and by experts of Haupttreuhandstelle Ost, who were responsible for more mundane objects. Notable items plundered by the Nazis included the Altar of Veit Stoss
and paintings by Raphael
, Rembrandt, Leonardo da Vinci
, Canaletto
and Bacciarelli
. Most of the important art pieces had been "secured" by the Nazis within six months of September 1939; by the end of 1942, German officials estimated that "over 90%" of the art previously in Poland was in their possession. Some art was shipped to German museums, such as the planned Führermuseum
in Linz
, while other art became the private property of Nazi officials. Over 516,000 individual art pieces were taken, including 2,800 paintings by European painters; 11,000 works by Polish painters; 1,400 sculptures, 75,000 manuscripts, 25,000 maps, and 90,000 books (including over 20,000 printed before 1800); as well as hundreds of thousands of other objects of artistic and historic value. Even exotic animals were taken from the zoo
s.
" (For Germans Only). Twenty-five museums and a host of other institutions were destroyed during the war. According to one estimate, by war's end 43% of the infrastructure of Poland's educational and research institutions and 14% of its museums had been destroyed. According to another, only 105 of pre-war Poland's 175 museums survived the war, and just 33 of these institutions were able to reopen. Of pre-war Poland's 603 scientific institutions, about half were totally destroyed, and only a few survived the war relatively intact.
Many university professors, as well as teachers, lawyers, artists, writers, priests and other members of the Polish intelligentsia
were arrested and executed, or transported to concentration camps
, during operations such as AB-Aktion. This particular campaign resulted in the infamous Sonderaktion Krakau
and the massacre of Lwów professors. During World War II Poland lost 39% to 45% of its physicians and dentists, 26% to 57% of its lawyers, 15% to 30% of its teachers, 30% to 40% of its scientists and university professors, and 18% to 28% of its clergy. The Jewish intelligentsia was exterminated altogether. The reasoning behind this policy was clearly articulated by a Nazi gauleiter
: "In my district, [any Pole who] shows signs of intelligence will be shot."
As part of their program to suppress Polish culture, the German Nazis attempted to destroy Christianity
in Poland, with a particular emphasis on the Roman Catholic Church
. In some parts of occupied Poland, Poles were restricted, or even forbidden, from attending religious services. At the same time, church property was confiscated, prohibitions were placed on using the Polish language in religious services, organizations affiliated with the Catholic Church were abolished, and it was forbidden to perform certain religious songs—or to read passages of the Bible
—in public. The worst conditions were found in the Reichsgau Wartheland
, which the Nazis treated as a laboratory for their anti-religious policies. Polish clergy and religious leaders figured prominently among portions of the intelligentsia that were targeted for extermination.
To forestall the rise of a new generation of educated Poles, German officials decreed that the schooling of Polish children would be limited to a few years of elementary education. Reichsführer-SS
Heinrich Himmler
wrote, in a memorandum of May 1940: "The sole purpose of this schooling is to teach them simple arithmetic, nothing above the number 500; how to write one's name; and the doctrine that it is divine law to obey the Germans .... I do not regard a knowledge of reading as desirable." Hans Frank
echoed him: "The Poles do not need universities or secondary schools; the Polish lands are to be converted into an intellectual desert." The situation was particularly dire in the former Polish territories beyond the General Government
, which had been annexed to the Third Reich
. The specific policy varied from territory to territory, but in general, there was no Polish-language education at all. German policy constituted a crash-Germanization of the populace. Polish teachers were dismissed, and some were invited to attend "orientation" meetings with the new administration, where they were either summarily arrested or executed on the spot. Some Polish schoolchildren were sent to German schools, while others were sent to special schools where they spent most of their time as unpaid laborers, usually on German-run farms; speaking Polish brought severe punishment. It was expected that Polish children would begin to work
once they finished their primary education at age 12 to 15. In the eastern territories not included in the General Government (Bezirk Bialystok
, Reichskommissariat Ostland
and Reichskommissariat Ukraine
) many primary schools were closed, and most education was conducted in non-Polish languages such as Ukrainian, Belorussian, and Lithuanian. In the Bezirk Bialystok region, for example, 86% of the schools that had existed before the war were closed down during the first two years of German occupation, and by the end of the following year that figure had increased to 93%.
The state of Polish primary schools was somewhat better in the General Government
, though by the end of 1940, only 30% of prewar schools were operational, and only 28% of prewar Polish children attended them. A German police memorandum
of August 1943 described the situation as follows:
In the General Government, the remaining schools were subjugated to the German educational system, and the number and competence of their Polish staff was steadily scaled down. All universities and most secondary schools were closed, if not immediately after the invasion, then by mid-1940. By late 1940, no official Polish educational institutions more advanced than a vocational school
remained in operation, and they offered nothing beyond the elementary trade and technical training required for the Nazi economy. Primary schooling was to last for seven years, but the classes in the final two years of the program were to be limited to meeting one day per week. There was no money for heating of the schools in winter. Classes and schools were to be merged, Polish teachers dismissed, and the resulting savings used to sponsor the creation of schools for children of the German minority or to create barracks for German troops. No new Polish teachers were to be trained. The educational curriculum
was censored; subjects such as literature, history and geography were removed. Old textbooks were confiscated and school libraries were closed. The new educational aims for Poles included convincing them that their national fate was hopeless, and teaching them to be submissive and respectful to Germans. This was accomplished through deliberate tactics such as police raids on schools, police inspections of student belongings, mass arrests of students and teachers, and the use of students as forced laborers, often by transporting them to Germany as seasonal workers.
The Germans were especially active in the destruction of Jewish culture in Poland; nearly all of the wooden synagogue
s there were destroyed. Moreover, the sale of Jewish literature
was banned throughout Poland.
Polish literature
faced a similar fate in territories annexed by Germany, where the sale of Polish books was forbidden. The public destruction of Polish books was not limited to those seized from libraries, but also included those books that were confiscated from private homes. The last Polish book titles not already proscribed were withdrawn in 1943; even Polish prayer books were confiscated. Soon after the occupation began, most libraries were closed; in Kraków, about 80% of the libraries were closed immediately, while the remainder saw their collections decimated by censors. The occupying powers destroyed Polish book collections, including the Sejm
and Senate
Library, the Przedziecki Estate Library, the Zamoyski Estate Library, the Central Military Library, and the Rapperswil Collection. In 1941, the last remaining Polish public library in the German-occupied territories was closed in Warsaw
. During the war, Warsaw libraries lost about a million volumes, or 30% of their collections. More than 80% of these losses were the direct result of purges rather than wartime conflict. Overall, it is estimated that about 10 million volumes from state-owned libraries and institutions perished during the war.
Polish flags and other symbols were confiscated. The war on the Polish language included the tearing down of signs in Polish and the banning of Polish speech in public places. Persons who spoke Polish in the streets were often insulted and even physically assaulted. The Germanization of place names prevailed. Many treasures of Polish culture – including memorials, plaques and monuments to national heroes (e.g., Kraków's Adam Mickiewicz monument
) – were destroyed. In Toruń
, all Polish monuments and plaques were torn down. Dozens of monuments were destroyed throughout Poland. The Nazis planned to level entire cities
.
The Germans prohibited publication of any regular Polish-language book, literary study or scholarly paper. In 1940, several German-controlled printing houses began operating in occupied Poland, publishing items such as Polish-German dictionaries and antisemitic and anticommunist novels. An aim of German propaganda was to rewrite Polish history: studies were published and exhibitions were held, claiming that Polish lands were in reality Germanic; that famous Poles, including Nicolaus Copernicus
, Veit Stoss
and Chopin, were ethnic Germans.
Censorship
at first targeted books that were considered to be "serious", including scientific and educational texts and texts that were thought to promote Polish patriotism; only fiction that was free of anti-German overtones was permitted. Banned literature included maps, atlases and English
- and French-language
publications, including dictionaries. Several non-public indexes of prohibited books were created, and over 1,500 Polish writers were declared "dangerous to the German state and culture". The index of banned authors included such Polish authors as Adam Mickiewicz
, Juliusz Słowacki, Stanisław Wyspiański, Bolesław Prus, Stefan Żeromski
, Józef Ignacy Kraszewski
, Władysław Reymont, Stanisław Wyspiański, Julian Tuwim
, Kornel Makuszyński
, Leopold Staff
, Eliza Orzeszkowa
and Maria Konopnicka
. Mere possession of such books was illegal and punishable by imprisonment. Door-to-door sale of books was banned, and bookstores—which required a license to operate—were either emptied out or closed.
Poles were forbidden, under penalty of death, to own radios. The press was reduced from over 2,000 publications to a few dozen, all censored
by the Germans. All pre-war newspapers were closed, and the few that were published during the occupation were new creations under the total control of the Germans. Such a thorough destruction of the press was unprecedented in contemporary history. The only officially available reading matter was the propaganda
press that was disseminated by the German occupation administration. Cinemas, now under the control of the German propaganda machine, saw their programming dominated by Nazi German movies, which were preceded by propaganda newsreel
s. The few Polish films permitted to be shown (about 20% of the total programming) were edited to eliminate references to Polish national symbols as well as Jewish actors and producers. Several propaganda films were shot in Polish, although no Polish films were shown after 1943. As all profits from Polish cinemas were officially directed toward German war production, attendance was discouraged by the Polish underground; a famous underground slogan declared: "Tylko świnie siedzą w kinie" ("Only pigs attend the movies"). A similar situation faced theaters, which were forbidden by the Germans to produce "serious" spectacles. Indeed, a number of propaganda pieces were created for theater stages. Hence, theatrical productions were also boycotted by the underground. In addition, actors were discouraged from performing in them and warned that they would be labeled as collaborators if they failed to comply. Ironically, restrictions on cultural performances were eased in Jewish ghetto
s, given that the Germans wished to distract ghetto inhabitants and prevent them from grasping their eventual fate
.
Music was the least restricted of cultural activities, probably because Hans Frank regarded himself as a fan of serious music. In time, he ordered the creation of the Orchestra and Symphony of the General Government in its capital, Kraków
. Numerous musical performances were permitted in cafes and churches, and the Polish underground chose to boycott only the propagandist opera
s. Visual artists, including painters and sculptors, were compelled to register with the German government; but their work was generally tolerated by the underground, unless it conveyed propagandist themes. Shuttered museums were replaced by occasional art exhibitions that frequently conveyed propagandist themes.
The development of Nazi propaganda
in occupied Poland can be divided into two main phases. Initial efforts were directed towards creating a negative image of pre-war Poland, and later efforts were aimed at fostering anti-Soviet, antisemitic, and pro-German attitudes.
(beginning 17 September 1939) that followed the German invasion
that had marked the start of World War II (beginning 1 September 1939), the Soviet Union
annexed the eastern parts
("Kresy
") of the Second Polish Republic
, comprising 201015 square kilometres (77,612 sq mi) and a population of 13.299 million. Hitler and Stalin shared the goal of obliterating Poland's political and cultural life, so that Poland would, according to historian Niall Ferguson, "cease to exist not merely as a place, but also as an idea".
The Soviet authorities regarded service to the prewar Polish state as a "crime against revolution" and "counter-revolutionary activity" and arrested many members of the Polish intelligentsia
, politicians, civil servants and academics, as well as ordinary persons suspected of posing a threat to Soviet rule. More than a million Polish citizens were deported to Siberia, many to Gulag
concentration camps, for years or decades. Others died, including over 20,000 military officers who perished in the Katyn massacre
s.
The Soviets quickly Sovietized
the annexed lands, introducing compulsory collectivization. They proceeded to confiscate, nationalize and redistribute private and state-owned Polish property. In the process, they banned political parties and public associations and imprisoned or executed their leaders as "enemies of the people". In line with Soviet anti-religious policy
, churches and religious organizations were persecuted. On 10 February 1940, the NKVD unleashed a campaign of terror against "anti-Soviet" elements in occupied Poland. The Soviets' targets included persons who often traveled abroad, persons involved in overseas correspondence, Esperantists
, philatelists, Red Cross workers, refugees, smugglers, priests and members of religious congregations, the nobility, landowners, wealthy merchants, bankers, industrialists, and hotel and restaurant owners. Stalin, like Hitler, strove to decapitate Polish society.
The Soviet authorities sought to remove all trace of the Polish history of the area now under their control. The name "Poland" was banned. Polish monuments were torn down. All institutions of the dismantled Polish state, including the Lwów University
, were closed, then reopened, mostly with new Russian directors. Soviet communist ideology became paramount in all teaching. Polish literature and language studies were dissolved by the Soviet authorities, and the Polish language was replaced with Russian or Ukrainian. Polish-language books were burned even in the primary schools. Polish teachers were not allowed in the schools, and many were arrested. Classes were held in Belorussian, Ukrainian and Lithuanian, with a new pro-Soviet curriculum
. As Polish-Canadian historian Piotr Wróbel
noted, citing British historians M. R. D. Foot and I. C. B. Dear
, majority of scholars believe that "In the Soviet occupation zone, conditions were only marginally less harsh than under the Germans." In September 1939, many Polish Jews had fled east; after some months of living under Soviet rule, some of them wanted to return to the German zone of occupied Poland.
All publications and media were subjected to censorship
. The Soviets sought to recruit Polish left-wing intellectuals who were willing to cooperate. Soon after the Soviet invasion, the Writers' Association of Soviet Ukraine created a local chapter in Lwów; there was a Polish-language theater and radio station. Polish cultural activities in Minsk
and Wilno
were less organized. These activities were strictly controlled by the Soviet authorities, which saw to it that these activities portrayed the new Soviet regime in a positive light and vilified the former Polish government.
The Soviet propaganda-motivated support for Polish-language cultural activities, however, clashed with the official policy of Russification
. The Soviets at first intended to phase out the Polish language and so banned Polish from schools, street signs, and other aspects of life. This policy was, however, reversed at times—first before the elections in October 1939; and later, after the German conquest of France
. By the late spring of 1940, Stalin, anticipating possible future conflict with the Third Reich, decided that the Poles might yet be useful to him. In the autumn of 1940, the Poles of Lwów observed the 85th anniversary of Adam Mickiewicz
's death. Soon, however, Stalin decided to re-implement the Russification policies. He reversed his decision again, however, when a need arose for Polish-language pro-Soviet propaganda following the German invasion of the Soviet Union; as a result Stalin permitted the creation of Polish forces in the East and later decided to create a communist People's Republic of Poland
.
Many Polish writers collaborated with the Soviets, writing anti-Polish, pro-Soviet propaganda. They included Jerzy Borejsza
, Tadeusz Boy-Żeleński
, Kazimierz Brandys
, Janina Broniewska
, Jan Brzoza, Teodor Bujnicki
, Leon Chwistek
, Zuzanna Ginczanka
, Halina Górska
, Mieczysław Jastrun, Stefan Jędrychowski, Stanisław Jerzy Lec, Tadeusz Łopalewski
, Juliusz Kleiner
, Jan Kott
, Jalu Kurek
, Karol Kuryluk
, Leopold Lewin
, Anatol Mikułko, Jerzy Pański
, Leon Pasternak
, Julian Przyboś
, Jerzy Putrament
, Jerzy Rawicz, Adolf Rudnicki
, Włodzimierz Słobodnik
, Włodzimierz Sokorski
, Elżbieta Szemplińska
, Anatol Stern
, Julian Stryjkowski
, Lucjan Szenwald
, Leopold Tyrmand
, Wanda Wasilewska
, Stanisław Wasilewski, Adam Ważyk
, Aleksander Weintraub
and Bruno Winawer
.
Other Polish writers, however, rejected the Soviet persuasions and instead published underground: Jadwiga Czechowiczówna, Jerzy Hordyński
, Jadwiga Gamska-Łempicka, Herminia Naglerowa
, Beata Obertyńska
, Ostap Ortwin
, Tadeusz Peiper
, Teodor Parnicki
, Juliusz Petry
. Some writers, such as Władysław Broniewski, after collaborating with the Soviets for a few months, joined the anti-Soviet opposition. Similarly, Aleksander Wat
, initially sympathetic to communism, was arrested by the Soviet NKVD
secret police
and exiled to Kazakhstan
.
Polish culture persisted in underground education
, publications, even theater. The Polish Underground State created a Department of Education and Culture (under Stanisław Lorentz) which, along with a Department of Labor and Social Welfare (under Jan Stanisław Jankowski and, later, Stefan Mateja) and a Department for Elimination of the Effects of War (under Antoni Olszewski and Bronisław Domosławski), became underground patrons of Polish culture. These Departments oversaw efforts to save from looting and destruction works of art in state and private collections (most notably, the giant paintings by Jan Matejko
that were concealed throughout the war). They compiled reports on looted and destroyed works and provided artists and scholars with means to continue their work and their publications and to support their families. Thus, they sponsored the underground publication (bibuła) of works by Winston Churchill
and Arkady Fiedler
and of 10,000 copies of a Polish primary-school primer
and commissioned artists to create resistance artwork (which was then disseminated by Operation N and like activities). Also occasionally sponsored were secret art exhibitions, theater performances and concerts.
Other important patrons of Polish culture included the Roman Catholic Church and Polish aristocrats, who likewise supported artists and safeguarded Polish heritage (notable patrons included Cardinal Adam Stefan Sapieha
and a former politician, Janusz Radziwiłł). Some private publishers, including Stefan Kamieński, Zbigniew Mitzner and the Ossolineum
publishing house, paid writers for books that would be delivered after the war.
. Most notably, the Secret Teaching Organization
(Tajna Organizacja Nauczycielska, TON) was created as early as in October 1939. Other organizations were created locally; after 1940 they were increasingly subordinated and coordinated by the TON, working closely with the Underground's State Department of Culture and Education, which was created in autumn 1941 and headed by Czesław Wycech, creator of the TON. Classes were either held under the cover of officially permitted activities or in private homes and other venues. By 1942, about 1,500,000 students took part in underground primary education; in 1944, its secondary school system covered 100,000 people, and university level courses were attended by about 10,000 students (for comparison, the pre-war enrollment at Polish universities was about 30,000 for the 1938/1939 year). More than 90,000 secondary-school pupils attended underground classes held by nearly 6,000 teachers between 1943 and 1944 in four districts of the General Government
(centered around the cities of Warsaw
, Kraków
, Radom
and Lublin
). Overall, in that period in the General Government, one of every three children was receiving some sort of education from the underground organizations; the number rose to about 70% for children old enough to attend secondary school. It is estimated that in some rural areas, the educational coverage was actually improved (most likely as courses were being organized in some cases by teachers escaped or deported from the cities). Compared to pre-war classes, the absence of Polish Jewish students was notable, as they were confined by the Nazi Germans to ghettos; there was, however, underground Jewish education in the ghettos, often organized with support from Polish organizations like TON. Students at the underground schools were often also members of the Polish resistance.
In Warsaw
, there were over 70 underground schools, with 2,000 teachers and 21,000 students. Underground Warsaw University educated 3,700 students, issuing 64 masters and 7 doctoral degrees. Warsaw Politechnic under occupation educated 3,000 students, issuing 186 engineering degrees, 18 doctoral ones and 16 habilitation
s. Jagiellonian University
issued 468 masters and 62 doctoral degrees, employed over 100 professors and teachers, and served more than 1,000 students per year. Throughout Poland, many other universities and institutions of higher education (of music, theater, arts, and others) continued their classes throughout the war.
Even some academic research was carried out (for example, by Władysław Tatarkiewicz, a leading Polish philosopher, and Zenon Klemensiewicz
, a linguist). Nearly 1,000 Polish scientists received funds from the Underground State, enabling them to continue their research.
The German attitude to underground education varied depending on whether it took place in the General Government or the annexed territories. The Germans had almost certainly realized the full scale of the Polish underground education system by about 1943, but lacked the manpower to put an end to it, probably prioritizing resources to dealing with the armed resistance. For the most part, closing underground schools and colleges in the General Government was not a top priority for the Germans. In 1943 a German report on education admitted that control of what was being taught in schools, particularly rural ones, was difficult, due to lack of manpower, transportation, and the activities of the Polish resistance. Some schools semi-openly taught unauthorized subjects in defiance of the German authorities. Hans Frank
noted in 1944 that although Polish teachers were a "mortal enemy" of the German states, they could not all be disposed of immediately. It was perceived as a much more serious issue in the annexed territories, as it hindered the process of Germanization; involvement in the underground education in those territories was much more likely to result in a sentence to a concentration camp.
Print
There were over 1,000 underground newspapers; among the most important were the Biuletyn Informacyjny
of Armia Krajowa
and Rzeczpospolita of the Government Delegation for Poland. In addition to publication of news (from intercepted Western radio transmissions), there were hundreds of underground publications dedicated to politics, economics, education, and literature (for example, Sztuka i Naród
). The highest recorded publication volume was an issue of Biuletyn Informacyjny printed in 43,000 copies; average volume of larger publication was 1,000–5,000 copies. The Polish underground also published booklets and leaflets from imaginary anti-Nazi German organizations
aimed at spreading disinformation and lowering morale among the Germans. Books were also sometimes printed. Other items were also printed, such as patriotic posters or fake German administration posters, ordering the Germans to evacuate Poland or telling Poles to register household cats.
The two largest underground publishers were the Bureau of Information and Propaganda
of Armia Krajowa and the Government Delegation for Poland. Tajne Wojskowe Zakłady Wydawnicze (Secret Military Publishing House) of Jerzy Rutkowski
(subordinated to the Armia Krajowa) was probably the largest underground publisher in the world. In addition to Polish titles, Armia Krajowa also printed false German newspapers designed to decrease morale of the occupying German forces (as part of Action N
). The majority of Polish underground presses were located in occupied Warsaw; until the Warsaw Uprising
in the summer of 1944 the Germans found over 16 underground printing presses (whose crews were usually executed or sent to concentration camps). The second largest center for Polish underground publishing was Kraków
. There, writers and editors faced similar dangers: for example, almost the entire editorial staff of the underground satirical paper Na Ucho was arrested, and its chief editors were executed in Kraków on 27 May 1944. (Na Ucho was the longest published Polish underground paper devoted to satire
; 20 issues were published starting in October 1943.) The underground press was supported by a large number of activists; in addition to the crews manning the printing presses, scores of underground couriers distributed the publications. According to some statistics, these couriers were among the underground members most frequently arrested by the Germans.
Under German occupation, the professions of Polish journalists and writers were virtually eliminated, as they had little opportunity to publish their work. The Underground State's Department of Culture sponsored various initiatives and individuals, enabling them to continue their work and aiding in their publication. Novels and anthologies were published by underground presses; over 1,000 works were published underground over the course of the war. Literary discussions were held, and prominent writers of the period working in Poland included, among others, Krzysztof Kamil Baczyński
, Leslaw Bartelski
, Tadeusz Borowski
, Tadeusz Boy-Żeleński
, Maria Dąbrowska
, Tadeusz Gajcy
, Zuzanna Ginczanka
, Jarosław Iwaszkiewicz, future Nobel Prize
winner Czesław Miłosz, Zofia Nałkowska, Jan Parandowski
, Leopold Staff
, Kazimierz Wyka
, and Jerzy Zawiejski. Writers wrote about the difficult conditions in the prisoner-of-war camps (Konstanty Ildefons Gałczyński, Stefan Flukowski
, Leon Kruczkowski
, Andrzej Nowicki
and Marian Piechała), the ghetto
s, and even from inside the concentration camps (Jan Maria Gisges
, Halina Gołczowa, Zofia Górska (Romanowiczowa), Tadeusz Hołuj, Kazimierz Andrzej Jaworski
and Marian Kubicki). Many writers did not survive the war, among them Krzysztof Kamil Baczyński, Wacław Berent, Tadeusz Boy-Żeleński, Tadeusz Gajcy, Zuzanna Ginczanka, Juliusz Kaden-Bandrowski
, Stefan Kiedrzyński
, Janusz Korczak
, Halina Krahelska
, Tadeusz Hollender
, Witold Hulewicz
, Ferdynand Antoni Ossendowski
, Włodzimierz Pietrzak, Leon Pomirowski, Kazimierz Przerwa-Tetmajer
and Bruno Schulz
.
With the censorship of Polish theater (and the virtual end of the Polish radio and film industry), underground theaters were created, primarily in Warsaw and Kraków, with shows presented in various underground venues. Beginning in 1940 the theaters were coordinated by the Secret Theatrical Council. Four large companies and more than 40 smaller groups were active throughout the war, even in the Gestapo's Pawiak
prison in Warsaw and in Auschwitz
; underground acting schools were also created. Underground actors, many of whom officially worked mundane jobs, included Karol Adwentowicz
, Elżbieta Barszczewska
, Henryk Borowski
, Wojciech Brydziński
, Władysław Hańcza, Stefan Jaracz
, Tadeusz Kantor
, Mieczysław Kotlarczyk, Bohdan Korzeniowski, Jan Kreczmar
, Adam Mularczyk
, Andrzej Pronaszko
, Leon Schiller
, Arnold Szyfman
, Stanisława Umińska
, Edmund Wierciński
, Maria Wiercińska, Karol Wojtyła (who later became Pope John Paul II
), Marian Wyrzykowski
, Jerzy Zawiejski and others. Theater was also active in the Jewish ghettos and in the camps for Polish war prisoners.
Polish music, including orchestras, also went underground. Top Polish musicians and directors (Adam Didur, Zbigniew Drzewiecki
, Jan Ekier
, Barbara Kostrzewska
, Zygmunt Latoszewski
, Jerzy Lefeld
, Witold Lutosławski, Andrzej Panufnik
, Piotr Perkowski
, Edmund Rudnicki, Eugenia Umińska
, Jerzy Waldorff
, Kazimierz Wiłkomirski, Maria Wiłkomirska, Bolesław Woytowicz, Mira Zimińska
) performed in restaurants, cafes, and private homes, with the most daring singing patriotic ballads
on the streets while evading German patrols. Patriotic songs were written, such as Siekiera, motyka
, the most popular song of occupied Warsaw. Patriotic puppet shows were staged. Jewish musicians (e.g. Władysław Szpilman) and artists likewise performed in ghettos and even in concentration camps. Although many of them died, some survived abroad, like Alexandre Tansman
in the United States, and Eddie Rosner
and Henryk Wars
in the Soviet Union.
Visual arts were also practiced underground. Cafes, restaurants and private homes were turned into galleries or museums; some were closed, with their owners, staff and patrons harassed, arrested or even executed. Polish underground artists included Eryk Lipiński
, Stanisław Miedza-Tomaszewski, Stanisław Ostoja-Chrostowski, and Konstanty Maria Sopoćko
. Some artists worked directly for the Underground State, forging
money and documents, and creating anti-Nazi art (satirical poster
s and caricature
s) or Polish patriotic symbols (for example kotwica
). These works were reprinted on underground presses, and those intended for public display were plastered to walls or painted on them as graffiti
. Many of these activities were coordinated under the Action N
Operation of Armia Krajowa's Bureau of Information and Propaganda
. In 1944 three giant (6 m, or 20 ft) puppets, caricatures of Hitler and Benito Mussolini
, were successfully displayed in public places in Warsaw. Some artists recorded life and death in occupied Poland; despite German bans on Poles using cameras, photographs and even films were taken. Although it was impossible to operate an underground radio station, underground auditions were recorded and introduced into German radios or loudspeaker systems. Underground postage stamps were designed and issued. Since the Germans also banned Polish sport activities, underground sport clubs were created; underground football matches and even tournaments were organized in Warsaw, Kraków and Poznań, although these were usually dispersed by the Germans. All of these activities were supported by the Underground State's Department of Culture.
, the Home Army's Bureau of Information and Propaganda even created three newsreel
s and over 30000 metres (98,425 ft) of film documenting the struggle.
Eugeniusz Lokajski
took some 1,000 photographs before he died; Sylwester Braun
some 3,000, of which 1,500 survive; Jerzy Tomaszewski some 1,000, of which 600 survived.
, based in Britain with the Polish Armed Forces in the West
wrote about the 303 Polish Fighter Squadron
. Melchior Wańkowicz
wrote about the Polish contribution to the capture of Monte Cassino
in Italy. Other writers working abroad included Jan Lechoń
, Antoni Słonimski, Kazimierz Wierzyński
and Julian Tuwim
. There were artists who performed for the Polish forces in the West as well as for the Polish forces in the East. Among musicians who performed for the Polish II Corps
in a Polska Parada cabaret were Henryk Wars
and Irena Anders
. The most famous song of the soldiers fighting under the Allies was the Czerwone maki na Monte Cassino
(The Red Poppies on Monte Cassino), composed by Feliks Konarski
and Alfred Schultz in 1944. There were also Polish theaters in exile in both the East and the West. Several Polish painters, mostly soldiers of the Polish II Corps, kept working throughout the war, including Tadeusz Piotr Potworowski, Adam Kossowski
, Marian Kratochwil, Bolesław Leitgeber and Stefan Knapp
.
wrote in God's Playground
: "In 1945, as a prize for untold sacrifices, the attachment of the survivors to their native culture was stronger than ever before." Similarly, close-knit underground classes, from primary schools to universities, were renowned for their high quality, due in large part to the lower ratio of students to teachers. The resulting culture was, however, different from the culture of interwar Poland for a number of reasons. The destruction of Poland's Jewish community
, Poland's postwar territorial changes
, and postwar migrations left Poland without its historic ethnic minorities. The multicultural nation was no more.
The experience of World War II placed its stamp on a generation
of Polish artists that became known as the "Generation of Columbuses
". The term denotes an entire generation of Poles, born soon after Poland regained independence in 1918, whose adolescence was marked by World War II. In their art, they "discovered a new Poland"–one forever changed by the atrocities of World War II and the ensuing creation of a communist Poland.
Over the years, nearly three-quarters of the Polish people have emphasized the importance of World War II to the Polish national identity. Many Polish works of art created since the war have centered around events of the war. Books by Tadeusz Borowski
, Adolf Rudnicki
, Henryk Grynberg
, Miron Białoszewski, Hanna Krall
and others; films, including those by Andrzej Wajda
(A Generation
, Kanał, Ashes and Diamonds
, Lotna
, A Love in Germany, Korczak, Katyń
); TV series (Four Tank Men and a Dog
and Stakes Larger than Life
); music (Powstanie Warszawskie
); and even comic book
s–all of these diverse works have reflected those times. Polish historian Tomasz Szarota
wrote in 1996:
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
was suppressed by the occupying powers of Nazi Germany
Nazi Germany
Nazi Germany , also known as the Third Reich , but officially called German Reich from 1933 to 1943 and Greater German Reich from 26 June 1943 onward, is the name commonly used to refer to the state of Germany from 1933 to 1945, when it was a totalitarian dictatorship ruled by...
and the Soviet Union
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....
, both of whom were hostile to Poland
Poland
Poland , officially the Republic of Poland , is a country in Central Europe bordered by Germany to the west; the Czech Republic and Slovakia to the south; Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania to the east; and the Baltic Sea and Kaliningrad Oblast, a Russian exclave, to the north...
's people
Poles
thumb|right|180px|The state flag of [[Poland]] as used by Polish government and diplomatic authoritiesThe Polish people, or Poles , are a nation indigenous to Poland. They are united by the Polish language, which belongs to the historical Lechitic subgroup of West Slavic languages of Central Europe...
and cultural heritage. Policies aimed at cultural genocide
Cultural genocide
Cultural genocide is a term that lawyer Raphael Lemkin proposed in 1933 as a component to genocide. The term was considered in the 1948 United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples juxtaposed next to the term ethnocide, but it was removed in the final document, replaced with...
resulted in the deaths of thousands of scholars and artists, and the theft and destruction of innumerable cultural artifacts. The "maltreatment of the Poles was one of many ways in which the Nazi and Soviet regimes had grown to resemble one another", wrote British historian Niall Ferguson
Niall Ferguson
Niall Campbell Douglas Ferguson is a British historian. His specialty is financial and economic history, particularly hyperinflation and the bond markets, as well as the history of colonialism.....
.
The occupiers looted and destroyed much of Poland's cultural and historical heritage, while persecuting and murdering members of the Polish cultural elite
Intelligentsia
The intelligentsia is a social class of people engaged in complex, mental and creative labor directed to the development and dissemination of culture, encompassing intellectuals and social groups close to them...
. Most Polish schools
Education in Poland
Since changes made in 2009 Education in Poland starts at the age of five or six for the 0 class and six or seven years in the 1st class of primary school . It is compulsory that children do one year of formal education before entering 1st class at no later than 7 years of age...
were closed, and those that remained open saw their curricula
Curriculum
See also Syllabus.In formal education, a curriculum is the set of courses, and their content, offered at a school or university. As an idea, curriculum stems from the Latin word for race course, referring to the course of deeds and experiences through which children grow to become mature adults...
altered significantly.
Nevertheless, underground organizations and individuals – in particular the Polish Underground State – saved much of Poland's most valuable cultural treasures, and worked to salvage as many cultural institutions and artifacts as possible. The Catholic Church and wealthy individuals contributed to the survival of some artists and their works. Despite severe retribution by the Nazis and Soviets, Polish underground cultural activities, including publications, concerts, live theater, education, and academic research, continued throughout the war.
Background
In 1795 Poland ceased to exist as an sovereignSovereign
A sovereign is the supreme lawmaking authority within its jurisdiction.Sovereign may also refer to:*Monarch, the sovereign of a monarchy*Sovereign Bank, banking institution in the United States*Sovereign...
nation and throughout the 18th century remained partitioned
Partitions of Poland
The Partitions of Poland or Partitions of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth took place in the second half of the 18th century and ended the existence of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, resulting in the elimination of sovereign Poland for 123 years...
by degrees between Prussian, Austrian and Russian empires. Not until the end of World War I was independence restored
Second Polish Republic
The Second Polish Republic, Second Commonwealth of Poland or interwar Poland refers to Poland between the two world wars; a period in Polish history in which Poland was restored as an independent state. Officially known as the Republic of Poland or the Commonwealth of Poland , the Polish state was...
and the nation reunited, although the drawing of boundary lines was, of necessity, a contentious issue
Polish Corridor
The Polish Corridor , also known as Danzig Corridor, Corridor to the Sea or Gdańsk Corridor, was a territory located in the region of Pomerelia , which provided the Second Republic of Poland with access to the Baltic Sea, thus dividing the bulk of Germany from the province of East...
. Independent Poland lasted for only 21 years before it was again attacked and divided among foreign powers.
On 1 September 1939, Germany invaded Poland, initiating World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
, and on 17 September, pursuant to the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact
Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact
The Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact, named after the Soviet foreign minister Vyacheslav Molotov and the German foreign minister Joachim von Ribbentrop, was an agreement officially titled the Treaty of Non-Aggression between Germany and the Soviet Union and signed in Moscow in the late hours of 23 August 1939...
, Poland was invaded by the Soviet Union
Soviet invasion of Poland (1939)
The 1939 Soviet invasion of Poland was a Soviet military operation that started without a formal declaration of war on 17 September 1939, during the early stages of World War II. Sixteen days after Nazi Germany invaded Poland from the west, the Soviet Union did so from the east...
. Subsequently Poland was partitioned again – between these two powers – and remained under their occupation for most of the war. By 1 October, Germany and the Soviet Union had completely overrun Poland, although the Polish government never formally surrendered, and the Polish Underground State, subordinate to the Polish government-in-exile, was soon formed. On 8 October, Nazi Germany annexed the western areas of pre-war Poland
Polish areas annexed by Nazi Germany
At the beginning of World War II, nearly a quarter of the pre-war Polish areas were annexed by Nazi Germany and placed directly under German civil administration, while the rest of Nazi occupied Poland was named as General Government...
and, in the remainder of the occupied area, established the General Government
General Government
The General Government was an area of Second Republic of Poland under Nazi German rule during World War II; designated as a separate region of the Third Reich between 1939–1945...
. The Soviet Union had to temporarily give up the territorial gains it made in 1939 due to the German invasion of the Soviet Union
Operation Barbarossa
Operation Barbarossa was the code name for Germany's invasion of the Soviet Union during World War II that began on 22 June 1941. Over 4.5 million troops of the Axis powers invaded the USSR along a front., the largest invasion in the history of warfare...
, but permanently re-annexed them after winning them back in mid-1944. Over the course of the war, Poland lost over 20% of its pre-war population amid an occupation that marked the end of the Second Polish Republic
Second Polish Republic
The Second Polish Republic, Second Commonwealth of Poland or interwar Poland refers to Poland between the two world wars; a period in Polish history in which Poland was restored as an independent state. Officially known as the Republic of Poland or the Commonwealth of Poland , the Polish state was...
.
Policy
Germany's policy toward the Polish nation and its culture evolved during the course of the war. Many German officials and military officers were initially not given any clear guidelines on the treatment of Polish cultural institutions, but this quickly changed. Immediately following their invasion of Poland, in September 1939 the Nazi German government implemented the first stages (the "small plan") of Generalplan OstGeneralplan Ost
Generalplan Ost was a secret Nazi German plan for the colonization of Eastern Europe. Implementing it would have necessitated genocide and ethnic cleansing to be undertaken in the Eastern European territories occupied by Germany during World War II...
. The basic policy was outlined by the Berlin Office of Racial Policy
Office of Racial Policy
The NSDAP Office of Racial Policy was a Nazi Party office created in 1933 for "unifying and supervising all indoctrination and propaganda work in the field of population and racial politics"...
in a document titled Concerning the Treatment of the Inhabitants of the Former Polish Territories, from a Racial-Political Standpoint. Slavic people living east of the pre-war German border were to be Germanized, enslaved
Slavery
Slavery is a system under which people are treated as property to be bought and sold, and are forced to work. Slaves can be held against their will from the time of their capture, purchase or birth, and deprived of the right to leave, to refuse to work, or to demand compensation...
or eradicated, depending on whether they lived in the territories directly annexed into the German state or in the General Government
General Government
The General Government was an area of Second Republic of Poland under Nazi German rule during World War II; designated as a separate region of the Third Reich between 1939–1945...
.
Much of the German policy on Polish culture was formulated during a meeting between the governor of the General Government, Hans Frank
Hans Frank
Hans Michael Frank was a German lawyer who worked for the Nazi party during the 1920s and 1930s and later became a high-ranking official in Nazi Germany...
, and Nazi Minister of Propaganda Joseph Goebbels
Joseph Goebbels
Paul Joseph Goebbels was a German politician and Reich Minister of Propaganda in Nazi Germany from 1933 to 1945. As one of Adolf Hitler's closest associates and most devout followers, he was known for his zealous oratory and anti-Semitism...
, at Łódź on 31 October 1939. Goebbels declared that "The Polish nation is not worthy to be called a cultured nation". He and Frank agreed that opportunities for the Poles to experience their culture should be severely restricted: no theaters, cinemas or cabarets; no access to radio or press; and no education. Frank suggested that the Poles should periodically be shown films highlighting the achievements of the Third Reich and should eventually be addressed only by megaphone
Megaphone
A megaphone, speaking-trumpet, bullhorn, blowhorn, or loud hailer is a portable, usually hand-held, cone-shaped horn used to amplify a person’s voice or other sounds towards a targeted direction. This is accomplished by channelling the sound through the megaphone, which also serves to match the...
. During the following weeks Polish schools beyond middle vocational levels were closed, as were theaters and many other cultural institutions. The only Polish-language
Polish language
Polish is a language of the Lechitic subgroup of West Slavic languages, used throughout Poland and by Polish minorities in other countries...
newspaper published in occupied Poland was also closed, and the arrests of Polish intellectuals began.
In March 1940, all cultural activities came under the control of the General Government's Department of People's Education and Propaganda (Abteilung für Volksaufklärung und Propaganda), whose name was changed a year later to the "Chief Propaganda Department" (Hauptabteilung Propaganda). Further directives issued in the spring and early summer reflected policies that had been outlined by Frank and Goebbels during the previous autumn. One of the Department's earliest decrees prohibited the organization of all but the most "primitive" of cultural activities without the Department's prior approval. Spectacles of "low quality", including those of an erotic or pornographic nature, were however an exception—those were to be popularized to appease the population and to show the world the "real" Polish culture as well as to create the impression that Germany was not preventing Poles from expressing themselves. German propaganda specialists invited critics from neutral countries to specially organized "Polish" performances that were specifically designed to be boring or pornographic, and presented them as typical Polish cultural activities. Polish-German cooperation in cultural matters, such as joint public performances, was strictly prohibited. Meanwhile, a compulsory registration scheme for writers and artists was introduced in August 1940. Then, in October, the printing of new Polish-language books was prohibited; existing titles were censored, and often confiscated and withdrawn.
In 1941, German policy evolved further, calling for the complete destruction of the Polish people
Poles
thumb|right|180px|The state flag of [[Poland]] as used by Polish government and diplomatic authoritiesThe Polish people, or Poles , are a nation indigenous to Poland. They are united by the Polish language, which belongs to the historical Lechitic subgroup of West Slavic languages of Central Europe...
, whom the Nazis regarded as "subhuman" (Untermensch
Untermensch
Untermensch is a term that became infamous when the Nazi racial ideology used it to describe "inferior people", especially "the masses from the East," that is Jews, Gypsies, Poles along with other Slavic people like the Russians, Serbs, Belarussians and Ukrainians...
en). Within ten to twenty years, the Polish territories under German occupation were to be entirely cleared of ethnic Poles and settled by German colonists
Colonialism
Colonialism is the establishment, maintenance, acquisition and expansion of colonies in one territory by people from another territory. It is a process whereby the metropole claims sovereignty over the colony and the social structure, government, and economics of the colony are changed by...
.
The policy was relaxed somewhat in the final years of occupation (1943–44), in view of German military defeats and the approaching Eastern Front. The Germans hoped that a more lenient cultural policy would lessen unrest and weaken the Polish Resistance. Poles were allowed back into those museums that now supported German propaganda and indoctrination, such as the newly created Chopin museum, which emphasized the composer's invented German roots. Restrictions on education, theater and music performances were eased.
Given that the Second Polish Republic
Second Polish Republic
The Second Polish Republic, Second Commonwealth of Poland or interwar Poland refers to Poland between the two world wars; a period in Polish history in which Poland was restored as an independent state. Officially known as the Republic of Poland or the Commonwealth of Poland , the Polish state was...
was a multicultural state, German policies and propaganda also sought to create and encourage conflicts between ethnic groups, fueling tension between Poles and Jews, and between Poles and Ukrainians. In Łódź, the Germans forced Jews to help destroy a monument to a Polish hero, Tadeusz Kościuszko
Tadeusz Kosciuszko
Andrzej Tadeusz Bonawentura Kościuszko was a Polish–Lithuanian and American general and military leader during the Kościuszko Uprising. He is a national hero of Poland, Lithuania, the United States and Belarus...
, and filmed them committing the act. Soon afterward, the Germans set fire to a Jewish synagogue
Synagogue
A synagogue is a Jewish house of prayer. This use of the Greek term synagogue originates in the Septuagint where it sometimes translates the Hebrew word for assembly, kahal...
and filmed Polish bystanders, portraying them in propaganda releases as a "vengeful mob." This divisive policy was reflected in the Germans' decision to destroy Polish education, while at the same time, showing relative tolerance toward the Ukrainian school system. As the high-ranking Nazi official
Gauleiter
A Gauleiter was the party leader of a regional branch of the NSDAP or the head of a Gau or of a Reichsgau.-Creation and Early Usage:...
Erich Koch
Erich Koch
Erich Koch was a Gauleiter of the Nazi Party in East Prussia from 1928 until 1945. Between 1941 and 1945 he was the Chief of Civil Administration of Bezirk Bialystok. During this period, he was also the Reichskommissar in Reichskommissariat Ukraine from 1941 until 1943...
explained, "We must do everything possible so that when a Pole meets a Ukrainian, he will be willing to kill the Ukrainian and conversely, the Ukrainian will be willing to kill the Pole."
Plunder
In 1939, as the occupation regime was being established, the Nazis confiscated Polish state property and much private property. Countless art objects were looted and taken to Germany, in line with a plan that had been drawn up well in advance of the invasion. The looting was supervised by experts of the SS-AhnenerbeAhnenerbe
The Ahnenerbe was a Nazi German think tank that promoted itself as a "study society for Intellectual Ancient History." Founded on July 1, 1935, by Heinrich Himmler, Herman Wirth, and Richard Walther Darré, the Ahnenerbe's goal was to research the anthropological and cultural history of the Aryan...
, Einsatzgruppen
Einsatzgruppen
Einsatzgruppen were SS paramilitary death squads that were responsible for mass killings, typically by shooting, of Jews in particular, but also significant numbers of other population groups and political categories...
units, who were responsible for art, and by experts of Haupttreuhandstelle Ost, who were responsible for more mundane objects. Notable items plundered by the Nazis included the Altar of Veit Stoss
Altar of Veit Stoss
The Altarpiece of Veit Stoss , also St. Mary's Altar , is the largest Gothic altarpiece in the World and a national treasure of Poland. It is located behind the Communion table of St. Mary's Basilica, Kraków...
and paintings by Raphael
Raphael
Raffaello Sanzio da Urbino , better known simply as Raphael, was an Italian painter and architect of the High Renaissance. His work is admired for its clarity of form and ease of composition and for its visual achievement of the Neoplatonic ideal of human grandeur...
, Rembrandt, Leonardo da Vinci
Leonardo da Vinci
Leonardo di ser Piero da Vinci was an Italian Renaissance polymath: painter, sculptor, architect, musician, scientist, mathematician, engineer, inventor, anatomist, geologist, cartographer, botanist and writer whose genius, perhaps more than that of any other figure, epitomized the Renaissance...
, Canaletto
Canaletto
Giovanni Antonio Canal better known as Canaletto , was a Venetian painter famous for his landscapes, or vedute, of Venice. He was also an important printmaker in etching.- Early career :...
and Bacciarelli
Bacciarelli
Bacciarelli is an Italian surname and Polish family:* Marcello Bacciarelli** Bacciarelli coat of arms...
. Most of the important art pieces had been "secured" by the Nazis within six months of September 1939; by the end of 1942, German officials estimated that "over 90%" of the art previously in Poland was in their possession. Some art was shipped to German museums, such as the planned Führermuseum
Führermuseum
The Führermuseum was an unrealized museum complex planned by Adolf Hitler for the Austrian city of Linz to display the collection of art plundered or purchased by the Nazis throughout Europe during World War II.-Design:...
in Linz
Linz
Linz is the third-largest city of Austria and capital of the state of Upper Austria . It is located in the north centre of Austria, approximately south of the Czech border, on both sides of the river Danube. The population of the city is , and that of the Greater Linz conurbation is about...
, while other art became the private property of Nazi officials. Over 516,000 individual art pieces were taken, including 2,800 paintings by European painters; 11,000 works by Polish painters; 1,400 sculptures, 75,000 manuscripts, 25,000 maps, and 90,000 books (including over 20,000 printed before 1800); as well as hundreds of thousands of other objects of artistic and historic value. Even exotic animals were taken from the zoo
Zoo
A zoological garden, zoological park, menagerie, or zoo is a facility in which animals are confined within enclosures, displayed to the public, and in which they may also be bred....
s.
Destruction
Many places of learning and culture—universities, schools, libraries, museums, theaters and cinemas—were either closed or designated as "Nur für DeutscheNur für Deutsche
The slogan Nur für Deutsche was during World War II, in many German-occupied countries, a racialist slogan indicating that certain establishments and transportation were reserved only for Germans...
" (For Germans Only). Twenty-five museums and a host of other institutions were destroyed during the war. According to one estimate, by war's end 43% of the infrastructure of Poland's educational and research institutions and 14% of its museums had been destroyed. According to another, only 105 of pre-war Poland's 175 museums survived the war, and just 33 of these institutions were able to reopen. Of pre-war Poland's 603 scientific institutions, about half were totally destroyed, and only a few survived the war relatively intact.
Intelligentsia
The intelligentsia is a social class of people engaged in complex, mental and creative labor directed to the development and dissemination of culture, encompassing intellectuals and social groups close to them...
were arrested and executed, or transported to concentration camps
Nazi concentration camps
Nazi Germany maintained concentration camps throughout the territories it controlled. The first Nazi concentration camps set up in Germany were greatly expanded after the Reichstag fire of 1933, and were intended to hold political prisoners and opponents of the regime...
, during operations such as AB-Aktion. This particular campaign resulted in the infamous Sonderaktion Krakau
Sonderaktion Krakau
Sonderaktion Krakau was the codename for a German operation against professors and academics from the University of Kraków and other Kraków universities at the beginning of World War II....
and the massacre of Lwów professors. During World War II Poland lost 39% to 45% of its physicians and dentists, 26% to 57% of its lawyers, 15% to 30% of its teachers, 30% to 40% of its scientists and university professors, and 18% to 28% of its clergy. The Jewish intelligentsia was exterminated altogether. The reasoning behind this policy was clearly articulated by a Nazi gauleiter
Gauleiter
A Gauleiter was the party leader of a regional branch of the NSDAP or the head of a Gau or of a Reichsgau.-Creation and Early Usage:...
: "In my district, [any Pole who] shows signs of intelligence will be shot."
As part of their program to suppress Polish culture, the German Nazis attempted to destroy Christianity
Christianity
Christianity is a monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus as presented in canonical gospels and other New Testament writings...
in Poland, with a particular emphasis on the Roman Catholic Church
Roman Catholic Church
The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the world's largest Christian church, with over a billion members. Led by the Pope, it defines its mission as spreading the gospel of Jesus Christ, administering the sacraments and exercising charity...
. In some parts of occupied Poland, Poles were restricted, or even forbidden, from attending religious services. At the same time, church property was confiscated, prohibitions were placed on using the Polish language in religious services, organizations affiliated with the Catholic Church were abolished, and it was forbidden to perform certain religious songs—or to read passages of the Bible
Bible
The Bible refers to any one of the collections of the primary religious texts of Judaism and Christianity. There is no common version of the Bible, as the individual books , their contents and their order vary among denominations...
—in public. The worst conditions were found in the Reichsgau Wartheland
Reichsgau Wartheland
Reichsgau Wartheland was a Nazi German Reichsgau formed from Polish territory annexed in 1939. It comprised the Greater Poland and adjacent areas, and only in part matched the area of the similarly named pre-Versailles Prussian province of Posen...
, which the Nazis treated as a laboratory for their anti-religious policies. Polish clergy and religious leaders figured prominently among portions of the intelligentsia that were targeted for extermination.
To forestall the rise of a new generation of educated Poles, German officials decreed that the schooling of Polish children would be limited to a few years of elementary education. Reichsführer-SS
Reichsführer-SS
was a special SS rank that existed between the years of 1925 and 1945. Reichsführer-SS was a title from 1925 to 1933 and, after 1934, the highest rank of the German Schutzstaffel .-Definition:...
Heinrich Himmler
Heinrich Himmler
Heinrich Luitpold Himmler was Reichsführer of the SS, a military commander, and a leading member of the Nazi Party. As Chief of the German Police and the Minister of the Interior from 1943, Himmler oversaw all internal and external police and security forces, including the Gestapo...
wrote, in a memorandum of May 1940: "The sole purpose of this schooling is to teach them simple arithmetic, nothing above the number 500; how to write one's name; and the doctrine that it is divine law to obey the Germans .... I do not regard a knowledge of reading as desirable." Hans Frank
Hans Frank
Hans Michael Frank was a German lawyer who worked for the Nazi party during the 1920s and 1930s and later became a high-ranking official in Nazi Germany...
echoed him: "The Poles do not need universities or secondary schools; the Polish lands are to be converted into an intellectual desert." The situation was particularly dire in the former Polish territories beyond the General Government
General Government
The General Government was an area of Second Republic of Poland under Nazi German rule during World War II; designated as a separate region of the Third Reich between 1939–1945...
, which had been annexed to the Third Reich
Polish areas annexed by Nazi Germany
At the beginning of World War II, nearly a quarter of the pre-war Polish areas were annexed by Nazi Germany and placed directly under German civil administration, while the rest of Nazi occupied Poland was named as General Government...
. The specific policy varied from territory to territory, but in general, there was no Polish-language education at all. German policy constituted a crash-Germanization of the populace. Polish teachers were dismissed, and some were invited to attend "orientation" meetings with the new administration, where they were either summarily arrested or executed on the spot. Some Polish schoolchildren were sent to German schools, while others were sent to special schools where they spent most of their time as unpaid laborers, usually on German-run farms; speaking Polish brought severe punishment. It was expected that Polish children would begin to work
Child labor
Child labour refers to the employment of children at regular and sustained labour. This practice is considered exploitative by many international organizations and is illegal in many countries...
once they finished their primary education at age 12 to 15. In the eastern territories not included in the General Government (Bezirk Bialystok
Bezirk Bialystok
The Bezirk Bialystok , also Belostok was an administrative unit that existed during the World War II occupation of Poland by Nazi Germany...
, Reichskommissariat Ostland
Reichskommissariat Ostland
Reichskommissariat Ostland, literally "Reich Commissariat Eastland", was the civilian occupation regime established by Nazi Germany in the Baltic states and much of Belarus during World War II. It was also known as Reichskommissariat Baltenland initially...
and Reichskommissariat Ukraine
Reichskommissariat Ukraine
Reichskommissariat Ukraine , literally "Reich Commissariat of Ukraine", was the civilian occupation regime of much of German-occupied Ukraine during World War II. Between September 1941 and March 1944, the Reichskommissariat was administered by Reichskommissar Erich Koch as a colony...
) many primary schools were closed, and most education was conducted in non-Polish languages such as Ukrainian, Belorussian, and Lithuanian. In the Bezirk Bialystok region, for example, 86% of the schools that had existed before the war were closed down during the first two years of German occupation, and by the end of the following year that figure had increased to 93%.
General Government
The General Government was an area of Second Republic of Poland under Nazi German rule during World War II; designated as a separate region of the Third Reich between 1939–1945...
, though by the end of 1940, only 30% of prewar schools were operational, and only 28% of prewar Polish children attended them. A German police memorandum
Memorandum
A memorandum is from the Latin verbal phrase memorandum est, the gerundive form of the verb memoro, "to mention, call to mind, recount, relate", which means "It must be remembered ..."...
of August 1943 described the situation as follows:
In the General Government, the remaining schools were subjugated to the German educational system, and the number and competence of their Polish staff was steadily scaled down. All universities and most secondary schools were closed, if not immediately after the invasion, then by mid-1940. By late 1940, no official Polish educational institutions more advanced than a vocational school
Vocational school
A vocational school , providing vocational education, is a school in which students are taught the skills needed to perform a particular job...
remained in operation, and they offered nothing beyond the elementary trade and technical training required for the Nazi economy. Primary schooling was to last for seven years, but the classes in the final two years of the program were to be limited to meeting one day per week. There was no money for heating of the schools in winter. Classes and schools were to be merged, Polish teachers dismissed, and the resulting savings used to sponsor the creation of schools for children of the German minority or to create barracks for German troops. No new Polish teachers were to be trained. The educational curriculum
Curriculum
See also Syllabus.In formal education, a curriculum is the set of courses, and their content, offered at a school or university. As an idea, curriculum stems from the Latin word for race course, referring to the course of deeds and experiences through which children grow to become mature adults...
was censored; subjects such as literature, history and geography were removed. Old textbooks were confiscated and school libraries were closed. The new educational aims for Poles included convincing them that their national fate was hopeless, and teaching them to be submissive and respectful to Germans. This was accomplished through deliberate tactics such as police raids on schools, police inspections of student belongings, mass arrests of students and teachers, and the use of students as forced laborers, often by transporting them to Germany as seasonal workers.
Synagogue
A synagogue is a Jewish house of prayer. This use of the Greek term synagogue originates in the Septuagint where it sometimes translates the Hebrew word for assembly, kahal...
s there were destroyed. Moreover, the sale of Jewish literature
Jewish literature
Jewish Literature refers to works written by Jews on Jewish themes, literary works of various themes written in Jewish languages, or literary works in other languages written by Jewish writers. Ancient Jewish literature includes Biblical literature and rabbinic literature...
was banned throughout Poland.
Polish literature
Polish literature
Polish literature is the literary tradition of Poland. Most Polish literature has been written in the Polish language, though other languages, used in Poland over the centuries, have also contributed to Polish literary traditions, including Yiddish, Lithuanian, Ukrainian, Belarusian, German and...
faced a similar fate in territories annexed by Germany, where the sale of Polish books was forbidden. The public destruction of Polish books was not limited to those seized from libraries, but also included those books that were confiscated from private homes. The last Polish book titles not already proscribed were withdrawn in 1943; even Polish prayer books were confiscated. Soon after the occupation began, most libraries were closed; in Kraków, about 80% of the libraries were closed immediately, while the remainder saw their collections decimated by censors. The occupying powers destroyed Polish book collections, including the Sejm
Sejm
The Sejm is the lower house of the Polish parliament. The Sejm is made up of 460 deputies, or Poseł in Polish . It is elected by universal ballot and is presided over by a speaker called the Marshal of the Sejm ....
and Senate
Senate of Poland
The Senate is the upper house of the Polish parliament, the lower house being the 'Sejm'. The history of the Polish Senate is rich in tradition and stretches back over 500 years, it was one of the first constituent bodies of a bicameral parliament in Europe and existed without hiatus until the...
Library, the Przedziecki Estate Library, the Zamoyski Estate Library, the Central Military Library, and the Rapperswil Collection. In 1941, the last remaining Polish public library in the German-occupied territories was closed in Warsaw
Warsaw
Warsaw is the capital and largest city of Poland. It is located on the Vistula River, roughly from the Baltic Sea and from the Carpathian Mountains. Its population in 2010 was estimated at 1,716,855 residents with a greater metropolitan area of 2,631,902 residents, making Warsaw the 10th most...
. During the war, Warsaw libraries lost about a million volumes, or 30% of their collections. More than 80% of these losses were the direct result of purges rather than wartime conflict. Overall, it is estimated that about 10 million volumes from state-owned libraries and institutions perished during the war.
Polish flags and other symbols were confiscated. The war on the Polish language included the tearing down of signs in Polish and the banning of Polish speech in public places. Persons who spoke Polish in the streets were often insulted and even physically assaulted. The Germanization of place names prevailed. Many treasures of Polish culture – including memorials, plaques and monuments to national heroes (e.g., Kraków's Adam Mickiewicz monument
Adam Mickiewicz Monument, Kraków
Adam Mickiewicz Monument in Kraków, , is one of the best known bronze monuments in Poland, and a favourite meeting place at the Main Market Square in the Old Town district of Kraków....
) – were destroyed. In Toruń
Torun
Toruń is an ancient city in northern Poland, on the Vistula River. Its population is more than 205,934 as of June 2009. Toruń is one of the oldest cities in Poland. The medieval old town of Toruń is the birthplace of the astronomer Nicolaus Copernicus....
, all Polish monuments and plaques were torn down. Dozens of monuments were destroyed throughout Poland. The Nazis planned to level entire cities
Planned destruction of Warsaw
The planned destruction of Warsaw refers to the largely realised plans by Nazi Germany to completely raze the city. The plan was put into full motion after the Warsaw Uprising in 1944...
.
Censorship and propaganda
Nicolaus Copernicus
Nicolaus Copernicus was a Renaissance astronomer and the first person to formulate a comprehensive heliocentric cosmology which displaced the Earth from the center of the universe....
, Veit Stoss
Veit Stoss
Veit Stoss was a leading Bavarian sculptor, mostly in wood, whose career covered the transition between the late Gothic and the Northern Renaissance. His style emphasized pathos and emotion, helped by his virtuoso carving of billowing drapery; it has been called "late Gothic Baroque"...
and Chopin, were ethnic Germans.
Censorship
Censorship
thumb|[[Book burning]] following the [[1973 Chilean coup d'état|1973 coup]] that installed the [[Military government of Chile |Pinochet regime]] in Chile...
at first targeted books that were considered to be "serious", including scientific and educational texts and texts that were thought to promote Polish patriotism; only fiction that was free of anti-German overtones was permitted. Banned literature included maps, atlases and English
English language
English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...
- and French-language
French language
French is a Romance language spoken as a first language in France, the Romandy region in Switzerland, Wallonia and Brussels in Belgium, Monaco, the regions of Quebec and Acadia in Canada, and by various communities elsewhere. Second-language speakers of French are distributed throughout many parts...
publications, including dictionaries. Several non-public indexes of prohibited books were created, and over 1,500 Polish writers were declared "dangerous to the German state and culture". The index of banned authors included such Polish authors as Adam Mickiewicz
Adam Mickiewicz
Adam Bernard Mickiewicz ) was a Polish poet, publisher and political writer of the Romantic period. One of the primary representatives of the Polish Romanticism era, a national poet of Poland, he is seen as one of Poland's Three Bards and the greatest poet in all of Polish literature...
, Juliusz Słowacki, Stanisław Wyspiański, Bolesław Prus, Stefan Żeromski
Stefan Zeromski
Stefan Żeromski was a Polish novelist and dramatist. He was called the "conscience of Polish literature". He also wrote under the pen names: Maurycy Zych, Józef Katerla and Stefan Iksmoreż.- Life :...
, Józef Ignacy Kraszewski
Józef Ignacy Kraszewski
Józef Ignacy Kraszewski was a Polish writer, historian and journalist who produced more than 200 novels and 150 novellas, short stories, and art reviews He is best known for his epic series on the history of Poland, comprising twenty-nine novels in seventy-nine parts.As a novelist writing about...
, Władysław Reymont, Stanisław Wyspiański, Julian Tuwim
Julian Tuwim
Julian Tuwim , sometimes used pseudonym "Oldlen" when writing song lyrics. He was a Polish poet, born in Łódź, Congress Poland, Russian Empire, of Jewish parents, and educated in Łódź and Warsaw where he studied law and philosophy at Warsaw University...
, Kornel Makuszyński
Kornel Makuszynski
Kornel Makuszyński was a Polish writer of children's and youth literature.-Life:Makuszyński attended the Jan Długosz gymnasium in Lviv . While in school he wrote occasional poetry , and had his first poem published in 1902 in the newspaper Słowo Polskie , for which he soon became a theatrical critic...
, Leopold Staff
Leopold Staff
Leopold Staff was a Polish poet and one of the greatest artists of European modernism honored two times by honorary degrees . He was also nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature...
, Eliza Orzeszkowa
Eliza Orzeszkowa
-External links:...
and Maria Konopnicka
Maria Konopnicka
Maria Konopnicka nee Wasiłowska , was a Polish poet, novelist, writer for children and youth, a translator, journalist and critic, as well as an activist for women's rights and Polish independence.Maria Konopnicka also composed a poem about the execution of the Irish patriot, Robert...
. Mere possession of such books was illegal and punishable by imprisonment. Door-to-door sale of books was banned, and bookstores—which required a license to operate—were either emptied out or closed.
Censorship
thumb|[[Book burning]] following the [[1973 Chilean coup d'état|1973 coup]] that installed the [[Military government of Chile |Pinochet regime]] in Chile...
by the Germans. All pre-war newspapers were closed, and the few that were published during the occupation were new creations under the total control of the Germans. Such a thorough destruction of the press was unprecedented in contemporary history. The only officially available reading matter was the propaganda
Propaganda
Propaganda is a form of communication that is aimed at influencing the attitude of a community toward some cause or position so as to benefit oneself or one's group....
press that was disseminated by the German occupation administration. Cinemas, now under the control of the German propaganda machine, saw their programming dominated by Nazi German movies, which were preceded by propaganda newsreel
Newsreel
A newsreel was a form of short documentary film prevalent in the first half of the 20th century, regularly released in a public presentation place and containing filmed news stories and items of topical interest. It was a source of news, current affairs and entertainment for millions of moviegoers...
s. The few Polish films permitted to be shown (about 20% of the total programming) were edited to eliminate references to Polish national symbols as well as Jewish actors and producers. Several propaganda films were shot in Polish, although no Polish films were shown after 1943. As all profits from Polish cinemas were officially directed toward German war production, attendance was discouraged by the Polish underground; a famous underground slogan declared: "Tylko świnie siedzą w kinie" ("Only pigs attend the movies"). A similar situation faced theaters, which were forbidden by the Germans to produce "serious" spectacles. Indeed, a number of propaganda pieces were created for theater stages. Hence, theatrical productions were also boycotted by the underground. In addition, actors were discouraged from performing in them and warned that they would be labeled as collaborators if they failed to comply. Ironically, restrictions on cultural performances were eased in Jewish ghetto
Ghetto
A ghetto is a section of a city predominantly occupied by a group who live there, especially because of social, economic, or legal issues.The term was originally used in Venice to describe the area where Jews were compelled to live. The term now refers to an overcrowded urban area often associated...
s, given that the Germans wished to distract ghetto inhabitants and prevent them from grasping their eventual fate
Holocaust in Poland
The Holocaust, also known as haShoah , was a genocide officially sanctioned and executed by the Third Reich during World War II. It took the lives of three million Polish Jews, destroying an entire civilization. Only a small percentage survived or managed to escape beyond the reach of the Nazis...
.
Music was the least restricted of cultural activities, probably because Hans Frank regarded himself as a fan of serious music. In time, he ordered the creation of the Orchestra and Symphony of the General Government in its capital, Kraków
Kraków
Kraków also Krakow, or Cracow , is the second largest and one of the oldest cities in Poland. Situated on the Vistula River in the Lesser Poland region, the city dates back to the 7th century. Kraków has traditionally been one of the leading centres of Polish academic, cultural, and artistic life...
. Numerous musical performances were permitted in cafes and churches, and the Polish underground chose to boycott only the propagandist opera
Opera
Opera is an art form in which singers and musicians perform a dramatic work combining text and musical score, usually in a theatrical setting. Opera incorporates many of the elements of spoken theatre, such as acting, scenery, and costumes and sometimes includes dance...
s. Visual artists, including painters and sculptors, were compelled to register with the German government; but their work was generally tolerated by the underground, unless it conveyed propagandist themes. Shuttered museums were replaced by occasional art exhibitions that frequently conveyed propagandist themes.
The development of Nazi propaganda
Nazi propaganda
Propaganda, the coordinated attempt to influence public opinion through the use of media, was skillfully used by the NSDAP in the years leading up to and during Adolf Hitler's leadership of Germany...
in occupied Poland can be divided into two main phases. Initial efforts were directed towards creating a negative image of pre-war Poland, and later efforts were aimed at fostering anti-Soviet, antisemitic, and pro-German attitudes.
Soviet occupation
After the Soviet invasion of PolandSoviet invasion of Poland
Soviet invasion of Poland can refer to:* the second phase of the Polish-Soviet War of 1920 when Soviet armies marched on Warsaw, Poland* Soviet invasion of Poland of 1939 when Soviet Union allied with Nazi Germany attacked Second Polish Republic...
(beginning 17 September 1939) that followed the German invasion
Invasion of Poland (1939)
The Invasion of Poland, also known as the September Campaign or 1939 Defensive War in Poland and the Poland Campaign in Germany, was an invasion of Poland by Germany, the Soviet Union, and a small Slovak contingent that marked the start of World War II in Europe...
that had marked the start of World War II (beginning 1 September 1939), the Soviet Union
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....
annexed the eastern parts
Polish areas annexed by the Soviet Union
Immediately after the German invasion of Poland in 1939, which marked the beginning of World War II, the Soviet Union invaded the eastern regions of the Second Polish Republic, which Poles referred to as the "Kresy," and annexed territories totaling 201,015 km² with a population of 13,299,000...
("Kresy
Kresy
The Polish term Kresy refers to a land considered by Poles as historical eastern provinces of their country. Today, it makes western Ukraine, western Belarus, as well as eastern Lithuania, with such major cities, as Lviv, Vilnius, and Hrodna. This territory belonged to the Polish-Lithuanian...
") of the Second Polish Republic
Second Polish Republic
The Second Polish Republic, Second Commonwealth of Poland or interwar Poland refers to Poland between the two world wars; a period in Polish history in which Poland was restored as an independent state. Officially known as the Republic of Poland or the Commonwealth of Poland , the Polish state was...
, comprising 201015 square kilometres (77,612 sq mi) and a population of 13.299 million. Hitler and Stalin shared the goal of obliterating Poland's political and cultural life, so that Poland would, according to historian Niall Ferguson, "cease to exist not merely as a place, but also as an idea".
Intelligentsia
The intelligentsia is a social class of people engaged in complex, mental and creative labor directed to the development and dissemination of culture, encompassing intellectuals and social groups close to them...
, politicians, civil servants and academics, as well as ordinary persons suspected of posing a threat to Soviet rule. More than a million Polish citizens were deported to Siberia, many to Gulag
Gulag
The Gulag was the government agency that administered the main Soviet forced labor camp systems. While the camps housed a wide range of convicts, from petty criminals to political prisoners, large numbers were convicted by simplified procedures, such as NKVD troikas and other instruments of...
concentration camps, for years or decades. Others died, including over 20,000 military officers who perished in the Katyn massacre
Katyn massacre
The Katyn massacre, also known as the Katyn Forest massacre , was a mass execution of Polish nationals carried out by the People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs , the Soviet secret police, in April and May 1940. The massacre was prompted by Lavrentiy Beria's proposal to execute all members of...
s.
The Soviets quickly Sovietized
Sovietization
Sovietization is term that may be used with two distinct meanings:*the adoption of a political system based on the model of soviets .*the adoption of a way of life and mentality modelled after the Soviet Union....
the annexed lands, introducing compulsory collectivization. They proceeded to confiscate, nationalize and redistribute private and state-owned Polish property. In the process, they banned political parties and public associations and imprisoned or executed their leaders as "enemies of the people". In line with Soviet anti-religious policy
Persecution of Christians in the Soviet Union
The history of Christianity in the Soviet Union was not limited to repression and secularization. Soviet policy toward religion was based on the ideology of Marxism-Leninism, which made atheism the official doctrine of the Soviet Union...
, churches and religious organizations were persecuted. On 10 February 1940, the NKVD unleashed a campaign of terror against "anti-Soviet" elements in occupied Poland. The Soviets' targets included persons who often traveled abroad, persons involved in overseas correspondence, Esperantists
Esperanto
is the most widely spoken constructed international auxiliary language. Its name derives from Doktoro Esperanto , the pseudonym under which L. L. Zamenhof published the first book detailing Esperanto, the Unua Libro, in 1887...
, philatelists, Red Cross workers, refugees, smugglers, priests and members of religious congregations, the nobility, landowners, wealthy merchants, bankers, industrialists, and hotel and restaurant owners. Stalin, like Hitler, strove to decapitate Polish society.
The Soviet authorities sought to remove all trace of the Polish history of the area now under their control. The name "Poland" was banned. Polish monuments were torn down. All institutions of the dismantled Polish state, including the Lwów University
Lviv University
The Lviv University or officially the Ivan Franko National University of Lviv is the oldest continuously operating university in Ukraine...
, were closed, then reopened, mostly with new Russian directors. Soviet communist ideology became paramount in all teaching. Polish literature and language studies were dissolved by the Soviet authorities, and the Polish language was replaced with Russian or Ukrainian. Polish-language books were burned even in the primary schools. Polish teachers were not allowed in the schools, and many were arrested. Classes were held in Belorussian, Ukrainian and Lithuanian, with a new pro-Soviet curriculum
Curriculum
See also Syllabus.In formal education, a curriculum is the set of courses, and their content, offered at a school or university. As an idea, curriculum stems from the Latin word for race course, referring to the course of deeds and experiences through which children grow to become mature adults...
. As Polish-Canadian historian Piotr Wróbel
Piotr Wróbel
Piotr Jan Wróbel is a Polish-Canadian historian, an Associate Professor in the Department of History at the Faculty of Arts and Science of the University of Toronto, as well as member of the Faculty at the Munk School of Global Affairs at the University of Trinity College in the University of...
noted, citing British historians M. R. D. Foot and I. C. B. Dear
I. C. B. Dear
I. C. B. Dear is a full-time writer specializing in maritime and military history. He formerly served in the Royal Marines.-Works:* The Oxford English: A Guide to the Language...
, majority of scholars believe that "In the Soviet occupation zone, conditions were only marginally less harsh than under the Germans." In September 1939, many Polish Jews had fled east; after some months of living under Soviet rule, some of them wanted to return to the German zone of occupied Poland.
Censorship
thumb|[[Book burning]] following the [[1973 Chilean coup d'état|1973 coup]] that installed the [[Military government of Chile |Pinochet regime]] in Chile...
. The Soviets sought to recruit Polish left-wing intellectuals who were willing to cooperate. Soon after the Soviet invasion, the Writers' Association of Soviet Ukraine created a local chapter in Lwów; there was a Polish-language theater and radio station. Polish cultural activities in Minsk
Minsk
- Ecological situation :The ecological situation is monitored by Republican Center of Radioactive and Environmental Control .During 2003–2008 the overall weight of contaminants increased from 186,000 to 247,400 tons. The change of gas as industrial fuel to mazut for financial reasons has worsened...
and Wilno
Vilnius
Vilnius is the capital of Lithuania, and its largest city, with a population of 560,190 as of 2010. It is the seat of the Vilnius city municipality and of the Vilnius district municipality. It is also the capital of Vilnius County...
were less organized. These activities were strictly controlled by the Soviet authorities, which saw to it that these activities portrayed the new Soviet regime in a positive light and vilified the former Polish government.
The Soviet propaganda-motivated support for Polish-language cultural activities, however, clashed with the official policy of Russification
Russification
Russification is an adoption of the Russian language or some other Russian attributes by non-Russian communities...
. The Soviets at first intended to phase out the Polish language and so banned Polish from schools, street signs, and other aspects of life. This policy was, however, reversed at times—first before the elections in October 1939; and later, after the German conquest of France
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
. By the late spring of 1940, Stalin, anticipating possible future conflict with the Third Reich, decided that the Poles might yet be useful to him. In the autumn of 1940, the Poles of Lwów observed the 85th anniversary of Adam Mickiewicz
Adam Mickiewicz
Adam Bernard Mickiewicz ) was a Polish poet, publisher and political writer of the Romantic period. One of the primary representatives of the Polish Romanticism era, a national poet of Poland, he is seen as one of Poland's Three Bards and the greatest poet in all of Polish literature...
's death. Soon, however, Stalin decided to re-implement the Russification policies. He reversed his decision again, however, when a need arose for Polish-language pro-Soviet propaganda following the German invasion of the Soviet Union; as a result Stalin permitted the creation of Polish forces in the East and later decided to create a communist People's Republic of Poland
People's Republic of Poland
The People's Republic of Poland was the official name of Poland from 1952 to 1990. Although the Soviet Union took control of the country immediately after the liberation from Nazi Germany in 1944, the name of the state was not changed until eight years later...
.
Many Polish writers collaborated with the Soviets, writing anti-Polish, pro-Soviet propaganda. They included Jerzy Borejsza
Jerzy Borejsza
Jerzy Borejsza , was a Polish communist activist and writer, chief of the communist press and publishing syndicate in the Stalinist period of the People's Republic of Poland.-Biography:Borejsza was born as Beniamin Goldberg to a Polish Jewish family...
, Tadeusz Boy-Żeleński
Tadeusz Boy-Zelenski
Tadeusz Kamil Marcjan Żeleński was a Polish stage writer, poet, critic above all, and translator of over 100 French literary classics into Polish...
, Kazimierz Brandys
Kazimierz Brandys
Kazimierz Brandys was a Polish essayist and writer of film scripts.Brandys was born in Łódź. He was the brother of the writer Marian Brandys and husband of the translator Maria Zenowicz. He completed a law degree at the University of Warsaw. He was first published in 1935 as a theatrical critic,...
, Janina Broniewska
Janina Broniewska
Janina Broniewska née Kunig was a Polish writer, author of many stories for kids and young adults, publicist and teacher. Between 1934 and 1937 she was the editor of the magazine Płomyk. Between 1944-1946 she edited "Polska Zbrojna"...
, Jan Brzoza, Teodor Bujnicki
Teodor Bujnicki
Teodor Bujnicki was a Polish poet, writing for "Żagary" magazine. During World War II he has been accused of collaborating with Soviet occupants in Vilnius. Member of Union of Polish Patriots. Sentenced to death in December of 1942 for treason by Polish Secret State and consequently shot by a...
, Leon Chwistek
Leon Chwistek
Leon Chwistek was a Polish avant-garde painter, theoretician of modern art, literary critic, logician, philosopher and mathematician.-Logic and philosophy:...
, Zuzanna Ginczanka
Zuzanna Ginczanka
-Life:Zuzanna Ginczanka was born Zuzanna Polina Gincburg in Kiev, then part of the Russian Empire. Her Jewish parents fled the Russian Revolution, settling in the Yiddish-speaking, then-Polish town of Równe, now in Ukraine....
, Halina Górska
Halina Górska
Halina Górska - was a Polish writer and a communist activist.Beginning in 1924 Górska became associated with the Lwów literary scene. Her first publication, in 1925, was "Mam mieszkanie" , in the Kurier Lwowski...
, Mieczysław Jastrun, Stefan Jędrychowski, Stanisław Jerzy Lec, Tadeusz Łopalewski
Tadeusz Łopalewski
Tadeusz Łopalewski was a Polish poet, prose writer, dramatist and translator of Russian literature and producer of many radio programs....
, Juliusz Kleiner
Juliusz Kleiner
-References:...
, Jan Kott
Jan Kott
Jan Kott was a well-known Polish critic and theoretician of the theatre.Born in Warsaw in 1914, Kott moved to the United States in 1966 and lectured at Yale and Berkeley. A poet, translator, and critic, he was also one of the finest essayists of the Polish school...
, Jalu Kurek
Jalu Kurek
Jalu Kurek was a Polish poet and prose writer, one of the figures of the so-called Kraków avant-garde...
, Karol Kuryluk
Karol Kuryluk
Karol Kuryluk was a Polish journalist, editor, activist, politician and diplomat. In 2002 he was honored by Yad Vashem for saving Jews in the Holocaust.- Biography :...
, Leopold Lewin
Leopold Lewin
Leopold Lewin was a Polish poet, journalist and translator. He graduated the Warsaw University in 1931. In the years 1939-1944 on emigration in USSR...
, Anatol Mikułko, Jerzy Pański
Jerzy Pański
Jerzy Pański was a Polish communist activist, publisher and translator of French and Russian literature. Between 1946 and 1948 he was the director of Polish Radio. Between 1948 and 1950 the president of the publishing house "Czytelnik" and between 1951 and 1953, the director of the Central...
, Leon Pasternak
Leon Pasternak
Leon Pasternak was a Polish poet and satirist...
, Julian Przyboś
Julian Przybos
Julian Przyboś was a Polish poet, essayist and translator, one of the most important poets of Kraków Avantgarde....
, Jerzy Putrament
Jerzy Putrament
Jerzy Putrament was a Polish writer, poet, editor, publicist and politician.-Biography:Jerzy Putrament was born into a family with patriotic traditions...
, Jerzy Rawicz, Adolf Rudnicki
Adolf Rudnicki
Adolf Rudnicki was a Polish-Jewish author and essayist, best known for his works about The Holocaust and the Jewish resistance in Poland during World War II....
, Włodzimierz Słobodnik
Włodzimierz Słobodnik
Włodzimierz Słobodnik was a Polish poet, translator of French, Russian, and Soviet literature, a satirist, and the author of numerous books for young adults....
, Włodzimierz Sokorski
Włodzimierz Sokorski
Włodzimierz Sokorski was a Polish communist official, writer, military journalist and eventually a Brigadier General in the Soviet-dominated People's Republic of Poland...
, Elżbieta Szemplińska
Elżbieta Szemplińska
Elżbieta Szemplińska née Sobolewska was a Polish poet and prose writer.She studied law at University of Warsaw. Her first pieces of prose were published in 1926 in the paper Robotnik. In 1932 she published her first full length novel "Narodziny człowieka"...
, Anatol Stern
Anatol Stern
Anatol Stern was a Polish poet, writer and art critic. Born October 24, 1899 to an assimilated family of Jewish ancestry, Stern studied at the Polish Studies Faculty of the University of Wilno but did not graduate...
, Julian Stryjkowski
Julian Stryjkowski
Julian Stryjkowski was a Polish journalist and writer, notable for his social prose of leftists character.He was born April 27, 1905 in Stryj , to a family of Hasidic Jews...
, Lucjan Szenwald
Lucjan Szenwald
Lucjan Szenwald was a Polish poet and communist activist.He first made his appearance as a member of the Skamander group with the poem "Przybierający księżyc" . However he was generally associated with a different literary group - the "Kwadryga" - which differentiated itself from the Skamanders by...
, Leopold Tyrmand
Leopold Tyrmand
Leopold Tyrmand was a Polish novelist and editor. He studied architecture for a year at L'Ecole des Beaux Arts in Paris before the war, and during the war was a resistance fighter in Poland, a waiter in Germany , and a prisoner in a Norwegian concentration camp...
, Wanda Wasilewska
Wanda Wasilewska
Wanda Wasilewska was a Polish and Soviet novelist and communist political activist who played an important role in the creation of a Polish division of the Soviet Red Army during World War II and the formation of the Polish People's Republic....
, Stanisław Wasilewski, Adam Ważyk
Adam Wazyk
Adam Ważyk born Ajzyk Wagman was a Polish poet, essayist and writer born to a Jewish family in Warsaw. In his early career, he was associated with the Kraków avant-garde led by Tadeusz Peiper who published Zwrotnica monthly. Ważyk wrote several collections of poetry in the interwar years...
, Aleksander Weintraub
Aleksander Weintraub
Aleksander Weintraub was Polish poet and writer, from a Jewish family from Lwów. In the 1930s he published in the Lwów magazine "Sygnaly" and other leftist papers. He was closely associated with the Polish Communist Party...
and Bruno Winawer
Bruno Winawer
Bruno Winawer was a Polish comedy and prose writer, a journalist and physicist. He was the author of popular social comedies, often based on scientific themes, numerous feuilletons on popular science and literature and a writer of early science fiction stories....
.
Other Polish writers, however, rejected the Soviet persuasions and instead published underground: Jadwiga Czechowiczówna, Jerzy Hordyński
Jerzy Hordyński
Jerzy Hordyński was a Polish poet and writer.He studied law, Oriental studies and Polish philology at the Jan Kazimierz University in Lwow. He was one of the best known poets from Lwów. After the city was occupied by the Soviets on 22 September 1939, he returned to his studies...
, Jadwiga Gamska-Łempicka, Herminia Naglerowa
Herminia Naglerowa
Herminia Naglerowa was a Polish writer and publicist....
, Beata Obertyńska
Beata Obertyńska
Beata Obertyńska, , born July 18, 1898, near Skole, died May 21, 1980 in London was a Polish writer and poet.-Life:Beata was the daughter of the Young Poland poet Maryla Wolska and granddaughter of the sculptor Wanda Monne Beata Obertyńska, (pen name "Marta Rudzka"), born July 18, 1898, near Skole,...
, Ostap Ortwin
Ostap Ortwin
Ostap Ortwin was a Polish journalist and literary critic....
, Tadeusz Peiper
Tadeusz Peiper
Tadeusz Peiper was a Polish poet, art critic, theoretician of literature and one of the precursors of the avant-garde movement in Polish poetry. Born to a Jewish family, Peiper converted to Catholicism as a young man and spent several years in Spain...
, Teodor Parnicki
Teodor Parnicki
Teodor Parnicki was a Polish writer, notable for his historical novels. He is especially renowned for works related to the early medieval Middle East, the late Roman and the Byzantine empires....
, Juliusz Petry
Juliusz Petry
Juliusz Petry - was a Polish writer, and radio director; he was the first director of Polish Radio in Lwów and Wilno and, after World War II, in Wrocław. He co-organized the re-launch of Polish Television, and was the author of numerous radio programs....
. Some writers, such as Władysław Broniewski, after collaborating with the Soviets for a few months, joined the anti-Soviet opposition. Similarly, Aleksander Wat
Aleksander Wat
Aleksander Wat, was a Polish poet, writer and art theoretician, one of the precursors of Polish futurism movement in early 1920s....
, initially sympathetic to communism, was arrested by the Soviet NKVD
NKVD
The People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs was the public and secret police organization of the Soviet Union that directly executed the rule of power of the Soviets, including political repression, during the era of Joseph Stalin....
secret police
Secret police
Secret police are a police agency which operates in secrecy and beyond the law to protect the political power of an individual dictator or an authoritarian political regime....
and exiled to Kazakhstan
Kazakhstan
Kazakhstan , officially the Republic of Kazakhstan, is a transcontinental country in Central Asia and Eastern Europe. Ranked as the ninth largest country in the world, it is also the world's largest landlocked country; its territory of is greater than Western Europe...
.
Patrons
Education in Poland during World War II
This article covers the topic of underground education in Poland during World War II. Secret learning prepared new cadres for the post-war reconstruction of Poland and countered the German and Soviet threat to exterminate the Polish culture....
, publications, even theater. The Polish Underground State created a Department of Education and Culture (under Stanisław Lorentz) which, along with a Department of Labor and Social Welfare (under Jan Stanisław Jankowski and, later, Stefan Mateja) and a Department for Elimination of the Effects of War (under Antoni Olszewski and Bronisław Domosławski), became underground patrons of Polish culture. These Departments oversaw efforts to save from looting and destruction works of art in state and private collections (most notably, the giant paintings by Jan Matejko
Jan Matejko
Jan Matejko was a Polish painter known for paintings of notable historical Polish political and military events. His most famous works include oil on canvas paintings like Battle of Grunwald, paintings of numerous other battles and court scenes, and a gallery of Polish kings...
that were concealed throughout the war). They compiled reports on looted and destroyed works and provided artists and scholars with means to continue their work and their publications and to support their families. Thus, they sponsored the underground publication (bibuła) of works by Winston Churchill
Winston Churchill
Sir Winston Leonard Spencer-Churchill, was a predominantly Conservative British politician and statesman known for his leadership of the United Kingdom during the Second World War. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest wartime leaders of the century and served as Prime Minister twice...
and Arkady Fiedler
Arkady Fiedler
Arkady Fiedler was a Polish writer, journalist and adventurer.He studied philosophy and natural science at the Jagiellonian University in Kraków and later in Poznań and the University of Leipzig...
and of 10,000 copies of a Polish primary-school primer
Alphabet book
An Alphabet book is a book primarily designed for young children. It presents letters of the alphabet with corresponding words and/or images. Some alphabet books feature capitals and lower case letter forms, keywords beginning with specific letters, or illustrations of keywords...
and commissioned artists to create resistance artwork (which was then disseminated by Operation N and like activities). Also occasionally sponsored were secret art exhibitions, theater performances and concerts.
Other important patrons of Polish culture included the Roman Catholic Church and Polish aristocrats, who likewise supported artists and safeguarded Polish heritage (notable patrons included Cardinal Adam Stefan Sapieha
Adam Stefan Sapieha
Prince Adam Stefan Stanisław Bonifacy Józef Sapieha was a Polish cardinal of the Roman Catholic Church who served as Archbishop of Kraków. Between 1922–1923 he was a senator of the Second Rzeczpospolita. In 1946, Pope Pius XII created him Cardinal....
and a former politician, Janusz Radziwiłł). Some private publishers, including Stefan Kamieński, Zbigniew Mitzner and the Ossolineum
Ossolineum
The Ossolineum or Zakład Narodowy im. Ossolińskich a meritorious department for Polish science and culture , which was founded for the Polish Nation in 1817 by Józef Maksymilian Ossoliński, and was opened in 1827 in Lviv.It was one of the most important Polish...
publishing house, paid writers for books that would be delivered after the war.
Education
In response to the German closure and censorship of Polish schools, resistance among teachers led almost immediately to the creation of large-scale underground educational activitiesEducation in Poland during World War II
This article covers the topic of underground education in Poland during World War II. Secret learning prepared new cadres for the post-war reconstruction of Poland and countered the German and Soviet threat to exterminate the Polish culture....
. Most notably, the Secret Teaching Organization
Secret Teaching Organization
Secret Teaching Organization was an underground Polish educational organization created in 1939 after the German invasion of Poland to provide underground education in occupied Poland....
(Tajna Organizacja Nauczycielska, TON) was created as early as in October 1939. Other organizations were created locally; after 1940 they were increasingly subordinated and coordinated by the TON, working closely with the Underground's State Department of Culture and Education, which was created in autumn 1941 and headed by Czesław Wycech, creator of the TON. Classes were either held under the cover of officially permitted activities or in private homes and other venues. By 1942, about 1,500,000 students took part in underground primary education; in 1944, its secondary school system covered 100,000 people, and university level courses were attended by about 10,000 students (for comparison, the pre-war enrollment at Polish universities was about 30,000 for the 1938/1939 year). More than 90,000 secondary-school pupils attended underground classes held by nearly 6,000 teachers between 1943 and 1944 in four districts of the General Government
General Government
The General Government was an area of Second Republic of Poland under Nazi German rule during World War II; designated as a separate region of the Third Reich between 1939–1945...
(centered around the cities of Warsaw
Warsaw
Warsaw is the capital and largest city of Poland. It is located on the Vistula River, roughly from the Baltic Sea and from the Carpathian Mountains. Its population in 2010 was estimated at 1,716,855 residents with a greater metropolitan area of 2,631,902 residents, making Warsaw the 10th most...
, Kraków
Kraków
Kraków also Krakow, or Cracow , is the second largest and one of the oldest cities in Poland. Situated on the Vistula River in the Lesser Poland region, the city dates back to the 7th century. Kraków has traditionally been one of the leading centres of Polish academic, cultural, and artistic life...
, Radom
Radom
Radom is a city in central Poland with 223,397 inhabitants . It is located on the Mleczna River in the Masovian Voivodeship , having previously been the capital of Radom Voivodeship ; 100 km south of Poland's capital, Warsaw.It is home to the biennial Radom Air Show, the largest and...
and Lublin
Lublin
Lublin is the ninth largest city in Poland. It is the capital of Lublin Voivodeship with a population of 350,392 . Lublin is also the largest Polish city east of the Vistula river...
). Overall, in that period in the General Government, one of every three children was receiving some sort of education from the underground organizations; the number rose to about 70% for children old enough to attend secondary school. It is estimated that in some rural areas, the educational coverage was actually improved (most likely as courses were being organized in some cases by teachers escaped or deported from the cities). Compared to pre-war classes, the absence of Polish Jewish students was notable, as they were confined by the Nazi Germans to ghettos; there was, however, underground Jewish education in the ghettos, often organized with support from Polish organizations like TON. Students at the underground schools were often also members of the Polish resistance.
Warsaw
Warsaw is the capital and largest city of Poland. It is located on the Vistula River, roughly from the Baltic Sea and from the Carpathian Mountains. Its population in 2010 was estimated at 1,716,855 residents with a greater metropolitan area of 2,631,902 residents, making Warsaw the 10th most...
, there were over 70 underground schools, with 2,000 teachers and 21,000 students. Underground Warsaw University educated 3,700 students, issuing 64 masters and 7 doctoral degrees. Warsaw Politechnic under occupation educated 3,000 students, issuing 186 engineering degrees, 18 doctoral ones and 16 habilitation
Habilitation
Habilitation is the highest academic qualification a scholar can achieve by his or her own pursuit in several European and Asian countries. Earned after obtaining a research doctorate, such as a PhD, habilitation requires the candidate to write a professorial thesis based on independent...
s. Jagiellonian University
Jagiellonian University
The Jagiellonian University was established in 1364 by Casimir III the Great in Kazimierz . It is the oldest university in Poland, the second oldest university in Central Europe and one of the oldest universities in the world....
issued 468 masters and 62 doctoral degrees, employed over 100 professors and teachers, and served more than 1,000 students per year. Throughout Poland, many other universities and institutions of higher education (of music, theater, arts, and others) continued their classes throughout the war.
Even some academic research was carried out (for example, by Władysław Tatarkiewicz, a leading Polish philosopher, and Zenon Klemensiewicz
Zenon Klemensiewicz
Zenon Klemensiewicz was a Polish linguist, specialist on the Polish language, professor of the Jagiellonian University. He fought in World War I and World War II, and took part in the underground education in WWII occupied Poland....
, a linguist). Nearly 1,000 Polish scientists received funds from the Underground State, enabling them to continue their research.
The German attitude to underground education varied depending on whether it took place in the General Government or the annexed territories. The Germans had almost certainly realized the full scale of the Polish underground education system by about 1943, but lacked the manpower to put an end to it, probably prioritizing resources to dealing with the armed resistance. For the most part, closing underground schools and colleges in the General Government was not a top priority for the Germans. In 1943 a German report on education admitted that control of what was being taught in schools, particularly rural ones, was difficult, due to lack of manpower, transportation, and the activities of the Polish resistance. Some schools semi-openly taught unauthorized subjects in defiance of the German authorities. Hans Frank
Hans Frank
Hans Michael Frank was a German lawyer who worked for the Nazi party during the 1920s and 1930s and later became a high-ranking official in Nazi Germany...
noted in 1944 that although Polish teachers were a "mortal enemy" of the German states, they could not all be disposed of immediately. It was perceived as a much more serious issue in the annexed territories, as it hindered the process of Germanization; involvement in the underground education in those territories was much more likely to result in a sentence to a concentration camp.
Biuletyn Informacyjny
Biuletyn Informacyjny was a Polish weekly published covertly in occupied Poland during World War II.It was started in November 1939 in Warsaw as the main press release of the SZP, the first underground resistance organisation in Poland. Soon it was taken over by the Armia Krajowa and the Bureau of...
of Armia Krajowa
Armia Krajowa
The Armia Krajowa , or Home Army, was the dominant Polish resistance movement in World War II German-occupied Poland. It was formed in February 1942 from the Związek Walki Zbrojnej . Over the next two years, it absorbed most other Polish underground forces...
and Rzeczpospolita of the Government Delegation for Poland. In addition to publication of news (from intercepted Western radio transmissions), there were hundreds of underground publications dedicated to politics, economics, education, and literature (for example, Sztuka i Naród
Sztuka i Naród
Sztuka i Naród was a Polish monthly published covertly in Warsaw, occupied Poland during World War II. It was supported by the resistance group Konfederacja Narodu. It was published from April 1942 to Warsaw Uprising in August 1944. 16 issues were published...
). The highest recorded publication volume was an issue of Biuletyn Informacyjny printed in 43,000 copies; average volume of larger publication was 1,000–5,000 copies. The Polish underground also published booklets and leaflets from imaginary anti-Nazi German organizations
German Resistance
The German resistance was the opposition by individuals and groups in Germany to Adolf Hitler or the National Socialist regime between 1933 and 1945. Some of these engaged in active plans to remove Adolf Hitler from power and overthrow his regime...
aimed at spreading disinformation and lowering morale among the Germans. Books were also sometimes printed. Other items were also printed, such as patriotic posters or fake German administration posters, ordering the Germans to evacuate Poland or telling Poles to register household cats.
The two largest underground publishers were the Bureau of Information and Propaganda
Bureau of Information and Propaganda
The Bureau of Information and Propaganda of the Headquarters of Związek Walki Zbrojnej, later of Armia Krajowa - in short: BIP) a conspiracy department created in spring 1940 during the German occupation of Poland, inside the Związek Walki Zbrojnej, then of the Supreme Command of Armia Krajowa...
of Armia Krajowa and the Government Delegation for Poland. Tajne Wojskowe Zakłady Wydawnicze (Secret Military Publishing House) of Jerzy Rutkowski
Jerzy Rutkowski (activist)
Jerzy Rutkowski was a Polish political activist and resistance soldier. During World War II, he joined Polish resistance and was the head of the underground press operation, the Tajne Wojskowe Zakłady Wydawnicze, throughout its operations, from 1940 to 1945...
(subordinated to the Armia Krajowa) was probably the largest underground publisher in the world. In addition to Polish titles, Armia Krajowa also printed false German newspapers designed to decrease morale of the occupying German forces (as part of Action N
Action N
Operation N was a complex of sabotage, subversion and black-propaganda activities carried out by the Polish resistance against Nazi German occupation forces during World War II, from April 1941 to April 1944...
). The majority of Polish underground presses were located in occupied Warsaw; until the Warsaw Uprising
Warsaw Uprising
The Warsaw Uprising was a major World War II operation by the Polish resistance Home Army , to liberate Warsaw from Nazi Germany. The rebellion was timed to coincide with the Soviet Union's Red Army approaching the eastern suburbs of the city and the retreat of German forces...
in the summer of 1944 the Germans found over 16 underground printing presses (whose crews were usually executed or sent to concentration camps). The second largest center for Polish underground publishing was Kraków
Kraków
Kraków also Krakow, or Cracow , is the second largest and one of the oldest cities in Poland. Situated on the Vistula River in the Lesser Poland region, the city dates back to the 7th century. Kraków has traditionally been one of the leading centres of Polish academic, cultural, and artistic life...
. There, writers and editors faced similar dangers: for example, almost the entire editorial staff of the underground satirical paper Na Ucho was arrested, and its chief editors were executed in Kraków on 27 May 1944. (Na Ucho was the longest published Polish underground paper devoted to satire
Satire
Satire is primarily a literary genre or form, although in practice it can also be found in the graphic and performing arts. In satire, vices, follies, abuses, and shortcomings are held up to ridicule, ideally with the intent of shaming individuals, and society itself, into improvement...
; 20 issues were published starting in October 1943.) The underground press was supported by a large number of activists; in addition to the crews manning the printing presses, scores of underground couriers distributed the publications. According to some statistics, these couriers were among the underground members most frequently arrested by the Germans.
Under German occupation, the professions of Polish journalists and writers were virtually eliminated, as they had little opportunity to publish their work. The Underground State's Department of Culture sponsored various initiatives and individuals, enabling them to continue their work and aiding in their publication. Novels and anthologies were published by underground presses; over 1,000 works were published underground over the course of the war. Literary discussions were held, and prominent writers of the period working in Poland included, among others, Krzysztof Kamil Baczyński
Krzysztof Kamil Baczynski
Krzysztof Kamil Baczyński, was a Polish poet and Home Army soldier, one of the most renowned authors of the Generation of Columbuses, the young generation of Polish poets of whom many perished in the Warsaw Uprising.-Biography:...
, Leslaw Bartelski
Leslaw Bartelski
Lesław Bartelski was a Polish writer, perhaps best known for his work, Warsaw Ghetto Thermopolye and his novel The Blood-stained Wings.-Early life:...
, Tadeusz Borowski
Tadeusz Borowski
Tadeusz Borowski was a Polish writer and journalist. His wartime poetry and stories dealing with his experiences as a prisoner at Auschwitz are recognized as classics of Polish literature and had much influence in Central European society.- Early life :...
, Tadeusz Boy-Żeleński
Tadeusz Boy-Zelenski
Tadeusz Kamil Marcjan Żeleński was a Polish stage writer, poet, critic above all, and translator of over 100 French literary classics into Polish...
, Maria Dąbrowska
Maria Dabrowska
Maria Dąbrowska was a Polish writer.Dąbrowska was a member of the impoverished landed gentry. Interested both in literature and politics, she set herself up to help people born into poor circumstances. She studied sociology, philosophy, and natural sciences in Lausanne and Brussels and moved to...
, Tadeusz Gajcy
Tadeusz Gajcy
Tadeusz Stefan Gajcy was a Polish poet and Armia Krajowa soldier.He co-founded and edited the bibuła literary magazine, Sztuka i Naród...
, Zuzanna Ginczanka
Zuzanna Ginczanka
-Life:Zuzanna Ginczanka was born Zuzanna Polina Gincburg in Kiev, then part of the Russian Empire. Her Jewish parents fled the Russian Revolution, settling in the Yiddish-speaking, then-Polish town of Równe, now in Ukraine....
, Jarosław Iwaszkiewicz, future Nobel Prize
Nobel Prize
The Nobel Prizes are annual international awards bestowed by Scandinavian committees in recognition of cultural and scientific advances. The will of the Swedish chemist Alfred Nobel, the inventor of dynamite, established the prizes in 1895...
winner Czesław Miłosz, Zofia Nałkowska, Jan Parandowski
Jan Parandowski
Jan Parandowski was a Polish writer, essayist, and translator. Best known for his works relating to classical antiquity, he was also the president of the Polish PEN Club between 1933 and 1978, with a break during World War II.He was born in Lwów, Austria-Hungary and died in Warsaw.-Biography:Jan...
, Leopold Staff
Leopold Staff
Leopold Staff was a Polish poet and one of the greatest artists of European modernism honored two times by honorary degrees . He was also nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature...
, Kazimierz Wyka
Kazimierz Wyka
Kazimierz Wyka was a Polish historian, literary critic and a professor of the Jagiellonian University.He was a deputy to Polish parliament from 1952 to 1956....
, and Jerzy Zawiejski. Writers wrote about the difficult conditions in the prisoner-of-war camps (Konstanty Ildefons Gałczyński, Stefan Flukowski
Stefan Flukowski
Stefan Flukowski was a Polish writer, poet and translator. Recognized as a major Polish representative of surrealism....
, Leon Kruczkowski
Leon Kruczkowski
Leon Kruczkowski was a Polish writer and publicist, and a prominent figure of the Polish theatre in the post-WWII period. He wrote books and dramas. His best known work is the drama "Niemcy" written in 1949....
, Andrzej Nowicki
Andrzej Nowicki (writer)
Andrzej Nowicki was a Polish poet, satirical writer, and translator. He fought in the Polish September Campaign; imprisoned in the German POW camp in Woldenberg, he was engaged in organizing cultural activities there. From 1945 to 1948 he worked for the Polish Press Agency in London. He returned...
and Marian Piechała), the ghetto
Ghetto
A ghetto is a section of a city predominantly occupied by a group who live there, especially because of social, economic, or legal issues.The term was originally used in Venice to describe the area where Jews were compelled to live. The term now refers to an overcrowded urban area often associated...
s, and even from inside the concentration camps (Jan Maria Gisges
Jan Maria Gisges
Jan Maria Gisges was a Polish poet, prose writer and dramatist.He studied philology of Polish at University of Warsaw. Between 1943 and 1945 he was imprisoned by German Nazis in Auschwitz-Birkenau and other concentration camps. After the war he lived in Kielce where he worked for the county...
, Halina Gołczowa, Zofia Górska (Romanowiczowa), Tadeusz Hołuj, Kazimierz Andrzej Jaworski
Kazimierz Andrzej Jaworski
Kazimierz Andrzej Jaworski was a Polish poet, translator and publisher. In the interwar Poland, he was the founder and editor of an important literary magazine, Kamena. During WWII, he taught underground classes, was eventually arrested and imprisoned in the Sachsenhausen concentration camp...
and Marian Kubicki). Many writers did not survive the war, among them Krzysztof Kamil Baczyński, Wacław Berent, Tadeusz Boy-Żeleński, Tadeusz Gajcy, Zuzanna Ginczanka, Juliusz Kaden-Bandrowski
Juliusz Kaden-Bandrowski
Juliusz Kaden-Bandrowski was a Polish journalist and novelist.-Life:Juliusz Kazimierz Kaden-Bandrowski studied piano at conservatories in Lwów, Kraków and Leipzig...
, Stefan Kiedrzyński
Stefan Kiedrzyński
Stefan Kiedrzyński was a Polish writer and essayist. He has published several novels and screenplays, mainly comedies....
, Janusz Korczak
Janusz Korczak
Janusz Korczak, the pen name of Henryk Goldszmit was a Polish-Jewish children's author, and pediatrician known as Pan Doktor or Stary Doktor...
, Halina Krahelska
Halina Krahelska
Halina Krahelska was a Polish activist, publicist and writer. Member of the Polish Socialist Party, arrested by the Russian authorities and deported to Russia, where she joined the Trudoviks and took part in the Russian Revolution of 1917...
, Tadeusz Hollender
Tadeusz Hollender
Tadeusz Hollender was a Polish poet, translator and humorist. During World War II, he wrote satirical articles and poems in underground press, for that he was arrested by the German Gestapo and executed in May in the infamous prison, Pawiak....
, Witold Hulewicz
Witold Hulewicz
Witold Hulewicz was a Polish poet, literary critic, translator and publisher. He fought in the German army during World War I, then on the Polish side during the Greater Poland Uprising . He lived in Poznań, later, in Wilno and Warsaw. He founded a literary magazine, Zdrój, and worked with the...
, Ferdynand Antoni Ossendowski
Ferdynand Antoni Ossendowski
Antoni Ferdynand Ossendowski was a Polish writer, journalist, traveler, globetrotter, explorer and university professor...
, Włodzimierz Pietrzak, Leon Pomirowski, Kazimierz Przerwa-Tetmajer
Kazimierz Przerwa-Tetmajer
Kazimierz Przerwa-Tetmajer was a Polish poet, novelist, playwright, journalist and writer. He was a member of the Young Poland movement.-Life:...
and Bruno Schulz
Bruno Schulz
Bruno Schulz was a Polish writer, fine artist, literary critic and art teacher born to Jewish parents, and regarded as one of the great Polish-language prose stylists of the 20th century. Schulz was born in Drohobycz, in the province of Galicia then part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, and spent...
.
Visual arts and music
Pawiak
Pawiak was a prison built in 1835 in Warsaw, Poland.During the January 1863 Uprising, it served as a transfer camp for Poles sentenced by Imperial Russia to deportation to Siberia....
prison in Warsaw and in Auschwitz
Auschwitz concentration camp
Concentration camp Auschwitz was a network of Nazi concentration and extermination camps built and operated by the Third Reich in Polish areas annexed by Nazi Germany during World War II...
; underground acting schools were also created. Underground actors, many of whom officially worked mundane jobs, included Karol Adwentowicz
Karol Adwentowicz
Karol Adwentowicz was a Polish actor and theater director.Adwentowicz fought in the Polish Legions in World War I...
, Elżbieta Barszczewska
Elzbieta Barszczewska
Elżbieta Maria Barszczewska-Wyrzykowska was a Polish film and theater actress.She debuted in Polish Theater in Warsaw in 1934. She also starred in several movie roles, including 13 major ones. In occupied Poland, she took part in the activities of the underground theater. After the war she resumed...
, Henryk Borowski
Henryk Borowski
Henryk Borowski was a Polish theater, radio and film actor.- Filmography :* 1954: Domek z kart – as editor* 1959: Kamienne niebo – as professor* 1960: Krzyżacy – as Zygfryd de Löwe...
, Wojciech Brydziński
Wojciech Brydziński
Wojciech Brydziński was a Polish theatre, radio and film actor.-References:...
, Władysław Hańcza, Stefan Jaracz
Stefan Jaracz
Stefan Jaracz was a Polish actor and theater director. The Stefan Jaracz Theatre in Łódź, Poland is named after him.-Life:He was born in Stare Żukowice, near Tarnów, and died in Otwock, near Warsaw....
, Tadeusz Kantor
Tadeusz Kantor
Tadeusz Kantor was a Polish painter, assemblage artist, set designer and theatre director. Kantor is renowned for his revolutionary theatrical performances in Poland and abroad.- Life and career :...
, Mieczysław Kotlarczyk, Bohdan Korzeniowski, Jan Kreczmar
Jan Kreczmar
Jan Kreczmar was a Polish theatre and film actor.Brother of actor and director Jerzy Kreczmar, he was married to actress Justyna Kreczmarowa.-Selected filmography:* Family Life...
, Adam Mularczyk
Adam Mularczyk
Adam Mularczyk was a Polish theatre director and radio and film actor. He emigrated to the USA in 1974.- Films :*1972: Poszukiwany, poszukiwana*1971: Milion za Laurę*1971: Nie lubię poniedziałku...
, Andrzej Pronaszko
Andrzej Pronaszko
Andrzej Pronaszko was a Polish painter and scenographer, one of the most prominent representatives of the Young Poland movement and the Polish avant-garde of the 1920s and 1930s....
, Leon Schiller
Leon Schiller
Leon Schiller de Schildenfeld was a Polish theater and film director, critic and theoretician. He was also a composer and wrote theater and radio screenplays....
, Arnold Szyfman
Arnold Szyfman
Arnold Szyfman was a Polish theatre director and stage director. Founder of the Polish Theatre in Warsaw.-References:*...
, Stanisława Umińska
Stanisława Umińska
Stanisława Umińska was a Polish theatre actress.In early 1920s she was considered one of the rising stars of the Polish theatre, but in 1924 in Paris, France, she shot dead her dying fiance, Jan Żyznowski, upon his request as an act of euthanasia. Set free by the French court, she became a nurse...
, Edmund Wierciński
Edmund Wierciński
Edmund Wierciński was a Polish stage director, actor and educator.Married to actress Maria Wiercińska.-References:*...
, Maria Wiercińska, Karol Wojtyła (who later became Pope John Paul II
Pope John Paul II
Blessed Pope John Paul II , born Karol Józef Wojtyła , reigned as Pope of the Catholic Church and Sovereign of Vatican City from 16 October 1978 until his death on 2 April 2005, at of age. His was the second-longest documented pontificate, which lasted ; only Pope Pius IX ...
), Marian Wyrzykowski
Marian Wyrzykowski
Marian Wyrzykowski was a Polish theater actor....
, Jerzy Zawiejski and others. Theater was also active in the Jewish ghettos and in the camps for Polish war prisoners.
Polish music, including orchestras, also went underground. Top Polish musicians and directors (Adam Didur, Zbigniew Drzewiecki
Zbigniew Drzewiecki
Zbigniew Drzewiecki was a Polish pianist especially associated with the interpretation of Chopin's works, who was for most of his life a teacher of pianists. His pupils include several famous pianists of the 20th century, and his influence was therefore very pervasive.Drzewiecki was born in Warsaw...
, Jan Ekier
Jan Ekier
Jan Ekier is a Polish pianist and composer widely known for his authoritative edition of Chopin's music for the Polish National Edition. He was born in Kraków, Poland...
, Barbara Kostrzewska
Barbara Kostrzewska
Barbara Kostrzewska was a Polish singer and theater director. She performed from late 1930s till after the war, when she became involved in managing several theaters. During World War II she worked for Polish resistance Armia Krajowa and took part in the Warsaw Uprising....
, Zygmunt Latoszewski
Zygmunt Latoszewski
Zygmunt Latoszewski was a Polish conductor, theater director and music teacher. He was a conductor and director of many of Polish operas and philharmonics.-References:...
, Jerzy Lefeld
Jerzy Lefeld
Jerzy Lefeld was a Polish composer, pianist and a music teacher.Lefeld was born and died in Warsaw. From 1917 until World War II he taught piano at the Warsaw Conservatory. He became its professor in 1933...
, Witold Lutosławski, Andrzej Panufnik
Andrzej Panufnik
Sir Andrzej Panufnik was a Polish composer, pianist, conductor and pedagogue. He became established as one of the leading Polish composers, and as a conductor he was instrumental in the re-establishment of the Warsaw Philharmonic orchestra after World War II...
, Piotr Perkowski
Piotr Perkowski
Piotr Perkowski was a Polish composer....
, Edmund Rudnicki, Eugenia Umińska
Eugenia Uminska
Eugenia Umińska was a Polish violinist.Student of the Warsaw Conservatory. In the years 1932-1934 she was the concertmaster of the Orchestra of the Polish Radio in Warsaw. She took part in close to a hundred concerts before the start of World War II...
, Jerzy Waldorff
Jerzy Waldorff
Jerzy Waldorff-Preyss was a Polish writer, publicist, literary critic and music activist. Author of over 20 books, mostly on the subject of classical music...
, Kazimierz Wiłkomirski, Maria Wiłkomirska, Bolesław Woytowicz, Mira Zimińska
Mira Ziminska
Mira Zimińska or Maria Zimińska-Sygietyńska was a Polish theater actor and film director. She was a founder and long-time director of the Mazowsze folk group....
) performed in restaurants, cafes, and private homes, with the most daring singing patriotic ballads
Sung poetry
Sung poetry is a broad and imprecise music genre widespread in Eastern European countries, such as Poland and the Baltic States, to describe songs consisting of a poem and music written specially for that text. The compositions usually feature a delicate melody and scarce musical background, often...
on the streets while evading German patrols. Patriotic songs were written, such as Siekiera, motyka
Siekiera, motyka
Siekiera, motyka is a famous Polish military songs from the period of World War II. It became the most popular song of occupied Warsaw, and then, of entire occupied Poland.-Creation:...
, the most popular song of occupied Warsaw. Patriotic puppet shows were staged. Jewish musicians (e.g. Władysław Szpilman) and artists likewise performed in ghettos and even in concentration camps. Although many of them died, some survived abroad, like Alexandre Tansman
Alexandre Tansman
Alexandre Tansman was a Polish-born composer and virtuoso pianist. He spent his early years in his native Poland, but lived in France for most of his life...
in the United States, and Eddie Rosner
Eddie Rosner
Adolph Ignatievich Rosner, also known as Eddie Rosner was a Polish and Soviet Jazz musician called "The White Louis Armstrong" or "Polish Louis Armstrong" in different sources. This is in part because of his rendition of the St. Louis blues...
and Henryk Wars
Henryk Wars
Henryk Wars was a Polish and later American pop music composer. He wrote the music for 50 films in the interwar period in Poland and sixty more in the United States...
in the Soviet Union.
Visual arts were also practiced underground. Cafes, restaurants and private homes were turned into galleries or museums; some were closed, with their owners, staff and patrons harassed, arrested or even executed. Polish underground artists included Eryk Lipiński
Eryk Lipinski
Eryk Lipiński was a Polish artist. Satirist, caricaturist, essayist, he has designed posters, written plays and sketches for cabarets, as well as written books on related subjects.-Biography:...
, Stanisław Miedza-Tomaszewski, Stanisław Ostoja-Chrostowski, and Konstanty Maria Sopoćko
Konstanty Maria Sopocko
Konstanty Maria Sopoćko was a Polish artist, specializing in woodcuting. He created posters, advertisements, logos, bookplates and illustrations. He lectured at the Academy of Fine Arts in Warsaw.-References:...
. Some artists worked directly for the Underground State, forging
Forgery
Forgery is the process of making, adapting, or imitating objects, statistics, or documents with the intent to deceive. Copies, studio replicas, and reproductions are not considered forgeries, though they may later become forgeries through knowing and willful misrepresentations. Forging money or...
money and documents, and creating anti-Nazi art (satirical poster
Poster
A poster is any piece of printed paper designed to be attached to a wall or vertical surface. Typically posters include both textual and graphic elements, although a poster may be either wholly graphical or wholly text. Posters are designed to be both eye-catching and informative. Posters may be...
s and caricature
Caricature
A caricature is a portrait that exaggerates or distorts the essence of a person or thing to create an easily identifiable visual likeness. In literature, a caricature is a description of a person using exaggeration of some characteristics and oversimplification of others.Caricatures can be...
s) or Polish patriotic symbols (for example kotwica
Kotwica
The Kotwica was a World War II emblem of the Polish Secret State and Armia Krajowa . It was created in 1942 by members of the AK Wawer "Small Sabotage" unit as an easily usable emblem for the Polish struggle to regain independence. The initial meaning of the initials "PW" was "Pomścimy Wawer"...
). These works were reprinted on underground presses, and those intended for public display were plastered to walls or painted on them as graffiti
Graffiti
Graffiti is the name for images or lettering scratched, scrawled, painted or marked in any manner on property....
. Many of these activities were coordinated under the Action N
Action N
Operation N was a complex of sabotage, subversion and black-propaganda activities carried out by the Polish resistance against Nazi German occupation forces during World War II, from April 1941 to April 1944...
Operation of Armia Krajowa's Bureau of Information and Propaganda
Bureau of Information and Propaganda
The Bureau of Information and Propaganda of the Headquarters of Związek Walki Zbrojnej, later of Armia Krajowa - in short: BIP) a conspiracy department created in spring 1940 during the German occupation of Poland, inside the Związek Walki Zbrojnej, then of the Supreme Command of Armia Krajowa...
. In 1944 three giant (6 m, or 20 ft) puppets, caricatures of Hitler and Benito Mussolini
Benito Mussolini
Benito Amilcare Andrea Mussolini was an Italian politician who led the National Fascist Party and is credited with being one of the key figures in the creation of Fascism....
, were successfully displayed in public places in Warsaw. Some artists recorded life and death in occupied Poland; despite German bans on Poles using cameras, photographs and even films were taken. Although it was impossible to operate an underground radio station, underground auditions were recorded and introduced into German radios or loudspeaker systems. Underground postage stamps were designed and issued. Since the Germans also banned Polish sport activities, underground sport clubs were created; underground football matches and even tournaments were organized in Warsaw, Kraków and Poznań, although these were usually dispersed by the Germans. All of these activities were supported by the Underground State's Department of Culture.
Warsaw Uprising
During the Warsaw Uprising (August–October 1944), people in Polish-controlled territory endeavored to recreate the former day-to-day life of their free country. Cultural life was vibrant among both soldiers and the civilian population, with theaters, cinemas, post offices, newspapers and similar activities available. The 10th Underground Tournament of Poetry was held during the Uprising, with prizes being weaponry (most of the Polish poets of the younger generation were also members of the resistance). Headed by Antoni BohdziewiczAntoni Bohdziewicz
Antoni Bohdziewicz was a Polish screenplay writer and director, best known for his 1956 adaptation of Zemsta by Aleksander Fredro.Bohdziewicz was born in the city of Wilno, then part of the Russian Empire...
, the Home Army's Bureau of Information and Propaganda even created three newsreel
Newsreel
A newsreel was a form of short documentary film prevalent in the first half of the 20th century, regularly released in a public presentation place and containing filmed news stories and items of topical interest. It was a source of news, current affairs and entertainment for millions of moviegoers...
s and over 30000 metres (98,425 ft) of film documenting the struggle.
Eugeniusz Lokajski
Eugeniusz Lokajski
Eugeniusz Zenon Lokajski was a Polish athlete, gymnast and photographer. He is notable as the Champion of Poland in javelin throw and the creator of more than 1000 photos documenting the Warsaw Uprising.-Biography:...
took some 1,000 photographs before he died; Sylwester Braun
Sylwester Braun
Sylwester Braun was a Polish photographer, Home Army officer. He was known as author of photography evidencing the Nazi Occupation of Poland and Warsaw Uprising....
some 3,000, of which 1,500 survive; Jerzy Tomaszewski some 1,000, of which 600 survived.
Culture in exile
Polish artists also worked abroad, outside of occupied Europe. Arkady FiedlerArkady Fiedler
Arkady Fiedler was a Polish writer, journalist and adventurer.He studied philosophy and natural science at the Jagiellonian University in Kraków and later in Poznań and the University of Leipzig...
, based in Britain with the Polish Armed Forces in the West
Polish Armed Forces in the West
Polish Armed Forces in the West refers to the Polish military formations formed to fight alongside the Western Allies against Nazi Germany and its allies...
wrote about the 303 Polish Fighter Squadron
No. 303 Polish Fighter Squadron
No. 303 Polish Fighter Squadron was one of 16 Polish squadrons in the Royal Air Force during the Second World War. It was the highest scoring RAF squadron of the Battle of Britain....
. Melchior Wańkowicz
Melchior Wankowicz
Melchior Wańkowicz was a Polish writer, journalist and publisher. He is most famous for his reporting for the Polish Armed Forces in the West during World War II and writing a book about the battle of Monte Cassino....
wrote about the Polish contribution to the capture of Monte Cassino
Battle of Monte Cassino
The Battle of Monte Cassino was a costly series of four battles during World War II, fought by the Allies against Germans and Italians with the intention of breaking through the Winter Line and seizing Rome.In the beginning of 1944, the western half of the Winter Line was being anchored by Germans...
in Italy. Other writers working abroad included Jan Lechoń
Jan Lechon
Leszek Józef Serafinowicz was a Polish poet, literary and theater critic, diplomat, and co-founder of the Skamander literary movement and the Polish Institute of Arts and Sciences of America.-Life:Lechoń studied Polish language and literature at Warsaw University, by...
, Antoni Słonimski, Kazimierz Wierzyński
Kazimierz Wierzynski
Kazimierz Wierzyński was a Polish poet and journalist.-Life:Kazimierz Wierzyński was born in Drohobycz, Kingdom of Galicia and Lodomeria, and died in London....
and Julian Tuwim
Julian Tuwim
Julian Tuwim , sometimes used pseudonym "Oldlen" when writing song lyrics. He was a Polish poet, born in Łódź, Congress Poland, Russian Empire, of Jewish parents, and educated in Łódź and Warsaw where he studied law and philosophy at Warsaw University...
. There were artists who performed for the Polish forces in the West as well as for the Polish forces in the East. Among musicians who performed for the Polish II Corps
Polish II Corps
Polish II Corps , 1943–1947, was a major tactical and operational unit of the Polish Armed Forces in the West during World War II. It was commanded by Lieutenant General Władysław Anders and by the end of 1945 it had grown to well over 100,000 soldiers....
in a Polska Parada cabaret were Henryk Wars
Henryk Wars
Henryk Wars was a Polish and later American pop music composer. He wrote the music for 50 films in the interwar period in Poland and sixty more in the United States...
and Irena Anders
Irena Anders
Irena Anders was a Polish stage actress and singer. During WWII she worked in the troupe of Henryk Wars, giving performances for the Polish Armed Forces in the West...
. The most famous song of the soldiers fighting under the Allies was the Czerwone maki na Monte Cassino
Czerwone maki na Monte Cassino
Czerwone maki na Monte Cassino is one of the best-known and most beloved Polish military songs of World War II...
(The Red Poppies on Monte Cassino), composed by Feliks Konarski
Feliks Konarski
Feliks Konarski was a Polish poet, songwriter, and cabaret performer.-Early life:...
and Alfred Schultz in 1944. There were also Polish theaters in exile in both the East and the West. Several Polish painters, mostly soldiers of the Polish II Corps, kept working throughout the war, including Tadeusz Piotr Potworowski, Adam Kossowski
Adam Kossowski
Adam Kossowski was a Polish artist, born in Nowy Sacz, notable for his works for the Catholic Church in England, where he arrived in 1943 as a refugee from Soviet labor camps and was invited in 1944 to join the Guild of Catholic Artists and Craftsmen.-Life in Poland:In 1923, uncertain about a...
, Marian Kratochwil, Bolesław Leitgeber and Stefan Knapp
Stefan Knapp
Stefan Knapp was a Polish born painter and sculptor, who worked in Great Britain. He developed and patented a technique of painting with enamel paint on steel facilitating decorating public architectural structures.His father name was Antoni and his mother was Julia née Wnuk.In 1935 he began...
.
Influence on postwar culture
The wartime attempts to destroy Polish culture may have strengthened it instead. Norman DaviesNorman Davies
Professor Ivor Norman Richard Davies FBA, FRHistS is a leading English historian of Welsh descent, noted for his publications on the history of Europe, Poland, and the United Kingdom.- Academic career :...
wrote in God's Playground
God's Playground
God's Playground is a book written in 1979 by Norman Davies, covering the history of Poland.Davies was inspired to the title by Jan Kochanowski's 1580s Boże igrzysko ....
: "In 1945, as a prize for untold sacrifices, the attachment of the survivors to their native culture was stronger than ever before." Similarly, close-knit underground classes, from primary schools to universities, were renowned for their high quality, due in large part to the lower ratio of students to teachers. The resulting culture was, however, different from the culture of interwar Poland for a number of reasons. The destruction of Poland's Jewish community
Holocaust in Poland
The Holocaust, also known as haShoah , was a genocide officially sanctioned and executed by the Third Reich during World War II. It took the lives of three million Polish Jews, destroying an entire civilization. Only a small percentage survived or managed to escape beyond the reach of the Nazis...
, Poland's postwar territorial changes
Territorial changes of Poland after World War II
The territorial changes of Poland after World War II were very extensive. In 1945, following the Second World War, Poland's borders were redrawn following the decisions made at the Potsdam Conference of 1945 at the insistence of the Soviet Union...
, and postwar migrations left Poland without its historic ethnic minorities. The multicultural nation was no more.
Generation
Generation , also known as procreation in biological sciences, is the act of producing offspring....
of Polish artists that became known as the "Generation of Columbuses
Generation of Columbuses
The Generation of Columbuses is a term denoting the entire generation of Poles born soon after Poland regained her independence in 1918, and whose adolescence has been marked by the tragic times of the World War II. The term itself was coined by Roman Bratny in his well-received 1957 novel...
". The term denotes an entire generation of Poles, born soon after Poland regained independence in 1918, whose adolescence was marked by World War II. In their art, they "discovered a new Poland"–one forever changed by the atrocities of World War II and the ensuing creation of a communist Poland.
Over the years, nearly three-quarters of the Polish people have emphasized the importance of World War II to the Polish national identity. Many Polish works of art created since the war have centered around events of the war. Books by Tadeusz Borowski
Tadeusz Borowski
Tadeusz Borowski was a Polish writer and journalist. His wartime poetry and stories dealing with his experiences as a prisoner at Auschwitz are recognized as classics of Polish literature and had much influence in Central European society.- Early life :...
, Adolf Rudnicki
Adolf Rudnicki
Adolf Rudnicki was a Polish-Jewish author and essayist, best known for his works about The Holocaust and the Jewish resistance in Poland during World War II....
, Henryk Grynberg
Henryk Grynberg
Henryk Grynberg is a Polish-Jewish writer and actor who survived the Nazi occupation. He was an award-winning novelist, short-story writer, poet, playwright and essayist who had authored more than thirty books of prose and poetry and two dramas...
, Miron Białoszewski, Hanna Krall
Hanna Krall
Hanna Krall is a Polish writer.-Childhood:Krall is of Jewish origin. During World War II she lost some of her close relatives. She survived the war only because she was hidden from the Nazis.-Journalism:...
and others; films, including those by Andrzej Wajda
Andrzej Wajda
Andrzej Wajda is a Polish film director. Recipient of an honorary Oscar, he is possibly the most prominent member of the unofficial "Polish Film School"...
(A Generation
A Generation
A Generation is a 1955 Polish film directed by Andrzej Wajda. It is based on the novel Pokolenie by Bohdan Czeszko, who also wrote the script, and it was Wajda's first film and the opening installment of what became his Three War Films trilogy set in the Second World War, completed by Kanal and...
, Kanał, Ashes and Diamonds
Ashes and Diamonds (film)
Ashes and Diamonds is a 1958 Polish film directed by Andrzej Wajda, based on the 1948 novel by Polish writer Jerzy Andrzejewski...
, Lotna
Lotna
Lotna is a Polish war film released in 1959 and directed by Andrzej Wajda.-Overview:This highly symbolic movie is both the director's tribute to the long and glorious history of the Polish cavalry, as well as a more ambiguous portrait of the passing of an era...
, A Love in Germany, Korczak, Katyń
Katyn (film)
Katyń is a 2007 Polish film about the 1940 Katyn massacre, directed by Academy Honorary Award winner Andrzej Wajda. It is based on the book Post Mortem: The Story of Katyn by Andrzej Mularczyk...
); TV series (Four Tank Men and a Dog
Czterej pancerni i pies
Czterej pancerni i pies was a Polish black and white TV series based on the book by Janusz Przymanowski. Made between 1966 and 1970, the series is composed of 21 episodes of 55 minutes each, divided into three seasons. It is set in 1944 and 1945, during World War Two, and follows the adventures of...
and Stakes Larger than Life
Stawka wieksza niz zycie
Stawka większa niż życie is a very successful cult Polish black and white TV series about the adventures of a Polish secret agent, Hans Kloss , who acts as a double agent in the Abwehr during Second World War in occupied Poland.The series was...
); music (Powstanie Warszawskie
Powstanie Warszawskie (album)
Powstanie Warszawskie is a second studio album released in March of 2005 by Polish band Lao Che. It consists of 10 songs illustrating the course of 1944 uprising in Warsaw, Poland. The album received many prestigious nominations and awards:* No...
); and even comic book
Comic book
A comic book or comicbook is a magazine made up of comics, narrative artwork in the form of separate panels that represent individual scenes, often accompanied by dialog as well as including...
s–all of these diverse works have reflected those times. Polish historian Tomasz Szarota
Tomasz Szarota
Tomasz Szarota is a Polish historian and publicist. As a historian, his areas of expertise relate to history of World War II, and everyday life in occupied Poland, in particular, in occupied Warsaw and other occupied major European cities....
wrote in 1996:
See also
- Football in occupied Poland (1939–1945)Football in occupied Poland (1939–1945)On September 1, 1939, the armed forces of Nazi Germany invaded Poland from the west initiating World War II. Two weeks later, on September 17, Soviet Union joined Germany in their attack on the Second Polish Republic. By early October, Poland was defeated. The occupied Poland was the only country...
- Home front during World War IIHome front during World War IIThe home front covers the activities of the civilians in a nation at war. World War II was a total war; homeland production became even more invaluable to both the Allied and Axis powers. Life on the home front during World War II was a significant part of the war effort for all participants and...
- Nazi crimes against ethnic PolesNazi crimes against ethnic PolesIn addition to about 2.9 million Polish Jews , about 2.8 million non-Jewish Polish citizens perished during the course of the war...
- The Holocaust in Poland
External links
- The German New Order in Poland: Part 1, Part 2
- Polish Department of National Heritage: Wartime losses - list of publications (mirror)
- Polish War losses during World War II – gallery on Wikimedia Commons
- Polish World War II posters of Occupied Poland – gallery on Wikimedia Commons
- World War II in Poland, its Impact on Everyday Life; Personal Perspective
- The Nazi Kultur in Poland by several authors of necessity temporarily anonymous written in Warsaw during the German Occupation