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| Acknowledgments | viii | |
| Introduction | xi | |
| Editor's note | xliii | |
| 1914-1939: A chronology | xlv | |
| Map of Interwar Poland | lii | |
| The Autobiographies | ||
| 1. | S. Etonis | 3 |
| Invasions during the World War | ||
| Traditional kheyder vs. progressive shule | ||
| Mother's death | ||
| Smuggling goods at the Russian border | ||
| Yeshiva | ||
| Homesickness | ||
| Studying musar | ||
| A heretical friend | ||
| Reading forbidden literature | ||
| Self-education for gymnasium | ||
| Work as a teacher | ||
| 2. | Khane | 20 |
| Feuding parents | ||
| Divorce | ||
| Homeless wandering | ||
| Life in an abandoned fortress | ||
| Feuding sisters | ||
| A mother's beating | ||
| Work in a bindery | ||
| Learning to read | ||
| Illegal political activism | ||
| Stealing across the border | ||
| Working in Vilna | ||
| Mother's death | ||
| 3. | A. Greyno | 51 |
| A poor family | ||
| Learning to read from Father | ||
| Move to a city | ||
| Failed business ventures | ||
| Sexual awakening | ||
| Learning to sew | ||
| An anti-Semitic landlord | ||
| A murdered child? A special friend | ||
| Trade unionism | ||
| A revolutionary meeting on Yom Kippur | ||
| Esperanto | ||
| Political trials | ||
| Becoming a librarian | ||
| Arrest, torture and prison | ||
| Jean Christophe | ||
| 4. | Henekh | 113 |
| Father's death | ||
| Yeshivas in Grodno and Radun | ||
| Corruption in yeshiva | ||
| Discovering secular literature | ||
| An unsuccessful love affair | ||
| Arson | ||
| Trapped in marriage to a rabbi's daughter | ||
| Contemplating suicide | ||
| 5. | Forget-me-not | 123 |
| Parental squabbles | ||
| A Jewish public school | ||
| Desecrating the Sabbath | ||
| Mother's early death | ||
| Joining an illegal political party | ||
| Life in a day orphanage | ||
| Chronic illness and a TOZ sanatorium | ||
| Working in a pharmacy | ||
| A dwindling family | ||
| Political disillusionment | ||
| Trade union activism | ||
| 6. | Ludwik Stockel | 141 |
| The Russians attack | ||
| Saved by a nursemaid | ||
| Life on a rural estate | ||
| The local Polish public school | ||
| Gymnasium in Czortkow | ||
| Writing poetry | ||
| Summer romance | ||
| A school trip | ||
| A bicycle race | ||
| Unrequited love | ||
| A socialist and a Zionist | ||
| Law school in Lwow | ||
| Anti-Semitic violence | ||
| 7. | Hanzi | 197 |
| A pious mother, an intellectual father | ||
| Living with Grandmother | ||
| A religious upbringing | ||
| A rare eye disease | ||
| Blessing from the Hafetz Hayyim | ||
| Tarbut gymnasium in Vilna | ||
| Stealing books | ||
| A member of Betar | ||
| A leg infection | ||
| A nurse from Siberia | ||
| A Zionist hero | ||
| 8. | The Stormer | 226 |
| Kheyder | ||
| Father's death | ||
| Moving to Lodz | ||
| Public school | ||
| Yeshiva | ||
| Sex among yeshiva students | ||
| Political awakening | ||
| A revolutionary cell | ||
| Factory work | ||
| Gordonia | ||
| Illegal emigration to Palestine | ||
| Life on the road | ||
| Stealing across the border | ||
| Capture and imprisonment | ||
| Return home | ||
| 9. | G. S. | 263 |
| Life on a rural estate | ||
| Public school | ||
| Betar | ||
| Attending commercial school | ||
| Relations between Poles and Jews | ||
| Life on hakhsharah | ||
| Failed aspirations | ||
| Work as a governess | ||
| 10. | EM.TEPA | 275 |
| An intellectual proletarian father | ||
| Mother's mental illness | ||
| Kheyder vs. public school | ||
| Studying the violin | ||
| Gymnasium | ||
| Work as a musician | ||
| Economic woes | ||
| 11. | G. W. | 296 |
| A shoemaker's son | ||
| Life in a small town | ||
| Kheyder | ||
| The family moves | ||
| Illness and recovery | ||
| Public school | ||
| A tailor's apprentice | ||
| Bundist youth movements | ||
| Normal family life | ||
| 12. | Esther | 321 |
| A hasidic family | ||
| Beys Yaakov school and Polish public school | ||
| Polish patriotism | ||
| Membership in Bnos Agudas Yisroel | ||
| A secret reader | ||
| Running a Beys Yaakov school | ||
| A forbidden friendship | ||
| Provincial anti-Semitism | ||
| Discovering socialism | ||
| 13. | J. Harefuler | 344 |
| Inferiority complexes | ||
| Kheyder and progressive Jewish elementary school | ||
| Mother's death | ||
| Stepmother | ||
| Work as a shoemaker | ||
| A frustrated actor's death | ||
| Communism | ||
| Camping trips | ||
| The Joint Distribution Committee | ||
| A Jewish citizen in Poland | ||
| 14. | Eter | 380 |
| A rabbi's daughter | ||
| Polish elementary school | ||
| A community feud | ||
| The commercial gymnasium | ||
| Work as a tutor | ||
| Self-education | ||
| Zionist politics | ||
| A poem by Julian Tuwim | ||
| 15. | Yudl | 391 |
| A poor family | ||
| Delivering milk | ||
| Public school | ||
| Street life | ||
| Shady dealings in a dye factory | ||
| A bootmaker's apprentice | ||
| A trip to Lodz | ||
| Betar, then the Bund | ||
| Leading a successful strike | ||
| Epilogue | 404 | |
| Endnotes | 406 | |
| Appendix I | Personalities | 423 |
| Appendix II | Organizations | 430 |
| Glossary | 434 |
| Price | Condition | Delivery | Seller | Action |
| $99.99 | Digital |
| WonderClub |
Apostolos Voutsas
reviewed Awakening Lives: Autobiographies of Jewish Youth in Poland before the Holocaust on July 18, 2010
Awakening Lives: Autobiographies of Jewish Youth in Poland before the Holocaust
For three years during the 1930s, the YIVO Institute for Jewish Research asked Jewish youth between 16 and 22 to write their biographies and send them in for research purposes. They offered a substantial cash prize to the author of the best one. Mostly it was Polish Jews who responded. Fifteen of these autobiographies are included in this book. The writers were anonymous, using pseudonyms and disguising details like their hometowns so they could write frankly without worrying what others would think.
What made the biggest impression on me was the sheer difficulty of life in Poland during that time. Most of the biographers in this book were poor, some abjectly so, experiencing hunger and outright starvation. It was difficult to get an education -- elementary school was free but textbooks were not; high schools charged tuition and were only in large cities, so students from villages had to leave home to go. Workers were paid low wages and often mistreated. I could understand why Communism held such great attraction for people in the thirties.
Of course, it is hard to read these accounts and not think of these young people's eventual fate. The epilogue says they were able to identify a few of the authors and most did not survive the war.
They will probably not interest the ordinary reader, but they are invaluable for people who want to know what Jewish life was like in Poland between the wars. Those few Polish Jews who survived the Holocaust and wrote their memoirs tended to wax nostalgic about their prior lives and their murdered families; the young people who wrote their autobiographies for YIVO had more reason to be honest. This is a very important historical document.
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Add Awakening Lives: Autobiographies of Jewish Youth in Poland before the Holocaust, This never-before-published collection of autobiographies written by young Polish Jews in the 1930s is extraordinary. Their candid and passionate writings not only reveal the personal struggles, ambitions, and dreams of fifteen young authors, they also of, Awakening Lives: Autobiographies of Jewish Youth in Poland before the Holocaust to the inventory that you are selling on WonderClubX
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Add Awakening Lives: Autobiographies of Jewish Youth in Poland before the Holocaust, This never-before-published collection of autobiographies written by young Polish Jews in the 1930s is extraordinary. Their candid and passionate writings not only reveal the personal struggles, ambitions, and dreams of fifteen young authors, they also of, Awakening Lives: Autobiographies of Jewish Youth in Poland before the Holocaust to your collection on WonderClub |