SYLWETKI: Adam Żurawin – bohater o tysiącu twarzy
PROFILES: Adam Żurawin – a Hero of a Thousand Faces
Author(s): Agnieszka HaskaSubject(s): History
Published by: Stowarzyszenie Centrum Badań nad Zagładą Żydów & IFiS PAN
Keywords: The Holocaust; sociological studies of the Holocaust; Jewish-German relations; the Case of Hotel Polski
Summary/Abstract: This article analyses unpublished memoirs of Adam Żurawin, a Gestapo informer, believed to have been involved in the so-called “Hotel Polski Affair”. Żurawin wrote them shortly before his death. They offer a rare opportunity to look at a German collaborator through his own eyes. The analysis is carried out from a few complementary points of view: historical (comparison with other sources), literary criticism (the poetics of personal document and self-creation), and psychological (motivations, feelings). Indeed, in his memoirs, Żurawin portrays himself as a knight-hero figure, who had never tarnished his hands with collaboration, but played a game with the Germans (and with the Poles), aimed only at saving his own family. The author tries to find what factors are involved in this self-creation.
Journal: Zagłada Żydów. Studia i Materiały
- Issue Year: 2006
- Issue No: 2
- Page Range: 177-201
- Page Count: 25
- Language: Polish