Warsaw's War

julie thorpe · Oct 8, 2008

I've just got back from a mid-term break spent in Warsaw, and am still reeling from what I learned there about the scale of their suffering during World War II (and since). My previous knowledge, gained from anecdotes told me 30 years ago by a Polish carpet-cleaner who had taken part in the Uprising of 1944, and from seeing Polanski's The Pianist, had in no way prepared me for what I have now learned.
Wow. Just - wow.
I could go on - but I won't, as it has all left me feeling a bit raw.
Someone out there should be telling these stories of courage, cruelty, bravery, treachery, and sheer determination to survive adainst the odds.
If there are already any novels out there dealing with the Ghetto Uprising and the subsequent 1944 Uprising, can anyone point me to it/them?

donroc · Oct 8, 2008

Mila 18 by Uris and The Wall by Hersey deal with the Ghetto uprising.

julie thorpe · Oct 8, 2008

Thanks, Donroc. I'll look out for them.

dolores haze · Oct 8, 2008

'The Wall' by John Hersey. Great stuff, but gruelling. Leon Uris wrote a book about it, too, but I can't remember the name.

The spy novels of Alan Furst are a little earlier in the war, but they're gorgeously atmospheric and evocative. A couple of them visit Poland and Polish characters.

Your next book, Julie? I'd imagine the research is going to be very painful, but you are right - these stories need to be told. Good luck!

lkp · Oct 8, 2008

I believe The Pianist was originally a book --- a memoir.

gwendy85 · Oct 8, 2008

I can understand how you feel about Warsaw. It was total devastation.

The Battle of Manila 1945 (the focus of the last part of my novel) is known as the Warsaw of Asia. Indeed, next to Warsaw, it was the most devastated city during World War II, with over 100,000 civilian deaths.

Reading about Manila at the time was horrific. With Warsaw being the most ravaged city at the time, I can only really speculate. Rather, all I want to do is speculate.

War is ugly, but I wholeheartedly agree with you that more should be written of that era. As the saying goes, those who forget the past are doomed to repeat it.

Just my comment.

julie thorpe · Oct 9, 2008

Not easy to forget in Warsaw. The Uprising Museum - crowded when we were there, and not just with tourists - sees to that. Incredibly moving. Interesting to note that the video clips of the most horrific atrocities were mounted in such a way that small children could not view them.

Doogs · Oct 9, 2008

I read Streets of Warsaw a few years back. Harrowing, and a fascinating glimpse into the Polish resistance...

http://www.amazon.com/dp/0974543500/?tag=absolutewritedm-20

Diviner · Oct 9, 2008

I toured Eastern Europe last spring and an still shattered by the experience more than fifty years after WWII and 20 years after the ending of communism. Not even South Africa with its aparthied and history of racial subjugation struck me as being so spiritually demoralizing, mostly because I fail to understand how Christian-heritage countries can be so utterly viscious and callous. I know I should not expect better of humanity, but I do. And it continues.

donroc · Oct 9, 2008

Ethnocentrism trumps religion.

pdr · Oct 9, 2008

Before I was...

kicked off the reviewing panel of Historical Novel Society by its American editors, for daring to write several critical reviews of American historicals with howling research errors in them, I reviewed this very moving book which is about people in Prague during the great massacre.

THE VISIBLE WORLD by Mark Slouka, Houghton Mifflin, April 2007, US$24.00 pb, 256 pages, ISBN:0-618-75643-4 and 978-0-618-75643-8

It will make you cry, Julie, but it is sound historically, at least so my Polish colleague in Japan told me.

Evaine · Oct 14, 2008

Anyone looking for a gentle introduction to Poland in the Second World War might like to consider The Silver Sword, by Ian Serraillier. It's a children's story, about a family of children (their parents have been arrested) who survive in the ruins.
The book was read to my class at school when I was seven, and such was the effect on my imagination, it was the book I asked for as a present if I passed my eleven+ exam (which used to be the exam that decided whether a child went to grammar school or secondary modern at the age of eleven).

julie thorpe · Oct 14, 2008

I'd forgotten about that wonderful story of Serrallier's. I used to read it to my pupils too, and even the most troublesome of the rapscallion little boys loved it. Thanks for remindng me! I looked it up on Google once, and it seems still to be very popular.

Warsaw's War

julie thorpe

donroc

Historicals and Horror rule

julie thorpe

dolores haze

international guttersnipe

lkp

gwendy85

~Proudly Mestiza~

julie thorpe

Doogs

Diviner

donroc

Historicals and Horror rule

pdr

Evaine

julie thorpe

Warsaw's War

Historicals and Horror rule

international guttersnipe

~*Proudly Mestiza*~

Historicals and Horror rule

~Proudly Mestiza~