A Notebook with camp poems belonging to former prisoner Bożena Janina Zdunek has enriched the Archives of the Memorial
Paweł Sawicki
The Auschwitz-Birkenau Museum is the largest museum institution and has the resources to ensure that such unique documents are treated appropriately. It is of particular importance to me that the notebook returns to the place of tribute to the victims,' said Professor Zdunek.
It is known from the post-war testimony of Bożena Janina Zdunek that the origins of this extraordinary collection of camp poetry most likely date back to the autumn of 1943. 'It was about then that the female prisoners in their limited spare time recited by heart the poems they had heard and remembered, which were created in the camp. It is not entirely clear how Ms Zdunek came into possession of the notebook, which, as the inscriptions on its cover indicate, was to serve as a register of camp numbers of deceased female prisoners. Perhaps she managed to obtain this notebook thanks to the ingenuity and courage of the female prisoners involved in the camp resistance movement,' said Dr. Wojciech Płosa, head of the Museum Archives.
Bożena Janina Zdunek had two notebooks of this type in the camp; however, one of them was stolen from her along with a bag in which she kept her prisoner possessions.
The notebook, in broad lines on 32 pages, contains texts of 17 camp poems, written in different writing styles. They include, among others, works by Krystyna Żywulska (actually Sonia Landau): "Marsz" (March), "Apel" (Roll-call), "List do Matki" (Letter to the mother), "Taniec" (Dance), "Mamo, bądź, zdrowa" (Mom, stay healrhy). These are poems that constitute the canon of camp poetry from KL Auschwitz.
'The notebook donated by Professor Adam Zdunek is an extraordinary and precious document. The very history of the creation of this collection of poems draws attention, and it must also be noted that it is a testimony to the great willpower to live and attachment to culture, which were characteristic of female prisoners. Amid the horrible daily realities of the Birkenau camp, they found the strength and time to collect what was so ephemeral, lyrics of camp poems created by female prisoners as snapshots of immense suffering and longing for freedom. Such actions undoubtedly required great courage and determination,' added Wojciech Płosa.
He emphasized that the notebook will be a priceless supplement to the collection of camp poems stored in our Archive: 'There are only very few examples of poems written in the camp. The majority of the collection is poetry texts remembered by former female and male prisoners, which were reproduced from memory after the war.'
Bożena Janina Zdunek (née Musiewicz) was born 29 June 1918 in the village of Siwki in Wołyń. She attended the famous
The original notebook with manuscripts of poems about the camp, which belonged to a former Auschwitz and Ravensbrück camp prisoner Bożena Janina Zdunek (known in the camp as Musiewicz), was donated to the Museum by her son, Professor Adam Zdunek.