{"id":38976,"date":"2025-04-11T14:50:00","date_gmt":"2025-04-11T12:50:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sybir.bialystok.pl\/?p=38976"},"modified":"2025-06-26T14:54:35","modified_gmt":"2025-06-26T12:54:35","slug":"paulina-wlodawer-where-the-world-ended-book-launch","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sybir.bialystok.pl\/en\/paulina-wlodawer-where-the-world-ended-book-launch\/","title":{"rendered":"Paulina W\u0142odawer: Where the World Ended \u2013 Book Launch"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\u201c\u0141azienki Park is just as distant for me as it is for you,\u201d wrote Regina Justman from the Warsaw Ghetto in a letter to her sister, Paulina W\u0142odawer, who had been deported to Siberia. The parallel fates of Jews who perished in the Holocaust and those who endured Soviet deportations formed the leitmotif of the event, dedicated to W\u0142odawer\u2019s memoirs \u2014 recently published by the Sybir Memorial Museum in partnership with the POLIN Museum of the History of Polish Jews.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On Friday evening, a small but notable group gathered at the Ludwik Zamenhof Centre of the Bia\u0142ystok Cultural Centre to reflect on W\u0142odawer\u2019s writings. A scientist and biologist from Warsaw, Paulina was deported with her husband Artur deep into the USSR during the third wave of Soviet deportations in June 1940. They were sent to a so-called \u201cspecial settlement\u201d in Asino, Siberia. The W\u0142odawers returned to Poland in the late spring of 1946.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n
\"Przy<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"Na<\/a><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Professor Alexander W\u0142odawer, the couple\u2019s son, now residing in the United States, joined the event online. The book was discussed by Przemys\u0142aw Kaniecki, PhD, of the POLIN Museum (which holds the original manuscript), and Anna Py\u017cewska, the memoir\u2019s editor, from the Scientific Department of the Seweryn Nowakowski Institute at the Sybir Memorial Museum. The event\u2019s significance was emphasized by the presence of Martyna Faustyna Zaniewska, Director of the Bia\u0142ystok Cultural Centre, and Professor Wojciech \u015aleszy\u0144ski, Director of the Sybir Memorial Museum.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Professor W\u0142odawer shared that his mother began recording her memories only after retiring in the early 1980s. She collaborated with her husband, who, though less experienced in writing, had an extraordinary memory. Together, they created a vivid, dramatic, and at times humorous portrayal of Jewish experiences \u2014 so similar, yet also distinct from those of Poles deported to the East.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cBy noon, a few important men from the administration came and ordered us to gather in the barrack\u2019s common room. Then they announced the outbreak of war with Germany,\u201d Paulina recalled of June 1941. \u201cThe news was truly shocking! Yesterday\u2019s ally, today\u2019s enemy! The reaction was unexpected \u2014 spontaneously, someone began singing Poland Is Not Yet Lost. We all sang with emotion, with tears in our eyes. I dare say I have never sung that anthem more truthfully \u2014 if I ever sang it at all, which seems very unlikely.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n
\"Przy<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"Grupa<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"Przy<\/a><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Marcin Zwolski, PhD of the Sybir Memorial Museum, who moderated the event, emphasized that the W\u0142odawer family\u2019s story sheds light on a little-known chapter of history. In public perception, the victims of the mass Soviet deportations of 1940\u20131941 are often assumed to have been exclusively ethnic Poles. Few are aware that the second-largest group of deportees were Polish Jews, many of whom had lived in central and western Poland before the war. Their experiences in the depths of the Soviet Union were, in most respects, virtually identical to those of their Polish compatriots.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Reflecting on her editorial work, Anna Py\u017cewska emphasized the tragedy of families torn apart by war: Jews dying of starvation in ghettos, pleading for help from relatives who were themselves starving in Siberia.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Kaniecki, PhD, noted that the W\u0142odawer family\u2019s memoirs and correspondence \u2014 now part of the POLIN Museum\u2019s collection \u2014 were among its first major acquisitions. He also praised Paulina\u2019s exceptional literary skill.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Professor W\u0142odawer also shared memories of his family\u2019s postwar life, including his own birth in a military-guarded hospital in Z\u0105bkowice \u015al\u0105skie \u2014 just two days before the Kielce pogrom \u2014 and their emigration during the antisemitic purges of 1968. When asked whether he would consider writing his own memoirs, he said he had prepared notes for his children but has not agreed to publish them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Where the World Ended<\/em> by Paulina W\u0142odawer is available at the Sybir Memorial Museum shop and online<\/a>:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n
\"Ok\u0142adka<\/a><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n\n\n\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

On Friday, the Ludwik Zamenhof Centre hosted the launch of “Where the World Ended”, the memoirs of Paulina W\u0142odawer.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":36756,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_editorskit_title_hidden":false,"_editorskit_reading_time":0,"_editorskit_is_block_options_detached":false,"_editorskit_block_options_position":"{}","footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-38976","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nPaulina W\u0142odawer: Where the World Ended \u2013 Book Launch - Muzeum Pami\u0119ci Sybiru<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/sybir.bialystok.pl\/en\/paulina-wlodawer-where-the-world-ended-book-launch\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Paulina W\u0142odawer: Where the World Ended \u2013 Book Launch - 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