Tadeusz Borowski quote
A man has only a limited number of ways in which he can express strong emotions or violent passions. He uses the same gestures as when what he feels is only petty and unimportant. He utters the same ordinary words.
And I think about my cell at the Pawiak prison. During the first week I felt I would not be able to endure a day without a book, without the circle of light under the parafin lamp in the evening, without a sheet of paper, without you. . . .
And in the midst of the mounting tide of atavism stand men from a different world, men who conspire in order to end conspiracies among people, men who steal so that there will be no more stealing in the world, men who kill so that people will cease to murder one another.
Despite the madness of war, we lived for a world that would be different. For a better world to come when all this is over. And perhaps even our being here is a step towards that world. Do you really think that, without the hope that such a world is possible, that the rights of man will be restored again, we could stand the concentration camp even for one day? It is that very hope that makes people go without a murmur to the gas chambers, keeps them from risking a revolt, paralyses them into numb inactivity. It is hope that breaks down family ties, makes mothers renounce their children, or wives sell their bodies for bread, or husbands kill. It is hope that compels man to hold on to one more day of life, because that day may be the day of liberation. Ah, and not even the hope for a different, better word, but simply for life, a life of peace and rest. Never before in the history of mankind has hope been stronger than man, but never also has it done so much harm as it has in this war, in this concentration camp. We were never taught how to give up hope, and this is why today we perish in gas chambers.
I risked my life to save lives. I’m not looking for glory. I just want people to know the truth about what happened.
It is the camp law: people going to their death must be deceived to the very end. This is the only permissible form of charity.
Real hunger is when one man regards another man as something to eat.
The name of God sounds strangely pointless, since the women and the infants will go on the trucks, every one of them, without exception. We all know what this means, and we look at each other with hate and horror.
There can be no beauty if it is paid for by human injustice, nor truth that passes over injustice in silence, nor moral virtue that condones it.
We run around with bowls in our hands, like highly skilled waiters. In complete silence we serve the soup, in complete silence we wrest the bowls out of hands that still try desperately to scrape up some food from the empty bottom, wanting to prolong the moment of eating, to take a last drop, to run a finger over the edge.
Why is it that nobody cries out, nobody spits in their faces, nobody jumps at their throats? We doff our caps to the S.S. men returning from the little wood; if our name is called out we obediently go with them to die, and we do nothing. We starve, we are drenched by rain, we are torn from our families. What is this mystery? This strange power of one man over another? This insane passivity that cannot be overcome? Our only strength is our great number; the gas chambers cannot accommodate all of us.
Tenets of Logotherapy
| Tenets |
| At first glance, Viktor Frankl’s philosophy of Logotherapy would seem a rather pessimistic response to a life marred by the horrors of the Holocaust. After reviewing the basic tenets of his philosophy, however, one can see that he firmly believes in the triumph of the human being. His very first tenet speaks volumes of his belief in endurance, but not just for the sake of survival. He believes that all life has meaning, and that meaning should motivate humans to live and discover that meaning.
The human spirit is referred to in the third tenet and several of the assumptions of Logotherapy, but it should be noted that the use of the term spirit is not “spiritual” or “religious.” In Frankl’s view, the spirit is the will of the human being. Frankl espoused that the “spirit” or “will” of a person affects the person’s health, capacity for love, imagination, and, yes, religious faith. The emphasis, however, is on the search for meaning, not the search for God nor any other supernatural existential being. Frankl also noted the barriers to humanity’s quest for meaning in life. He warns against “…affluence, hedonism, [and] materialism…” in the search for meaning. The warning is that some may mistake one of the aforementioned as the true meaning of life. Those who have suffered losses due to circumstance, injustice, or man’s seemingly limitless inhumanity to his fellow man, can attest that the search for meaning is not halted by such losses. In some cases, as with Frankl himself, the losses are the very catalysts to reinvigorate the search for meaning. The following list of tenets represents Frankl’s basic beliefs regarding the philosophy of Logotherapy: 1. Life has meaning under all circumstances, even the most miserable ones. |
Beginning of Logotherapy
At the age of 14, Frankl wrote a school paper, “We and the World Process”. In this he expressed the idea that there must exist a universal balancing principle. At age 15, he attended night classes in the people’s college even though he was still in high school. He took courses in applied Psychology and experimental Psychology. This course work motivated Frankl to write to Sigmund Freud. After Freud replied, a correspondence developed. During this time Freud accepted Frankl’s article Internationale Zeitschrift fur Psychoanalyse, for publication. However, by the time this article was published, Frankl had come under the influence of Alfred Adler and Individual Psychology.
At the age of 17, Frankl gave a lecture at the people’s college, for a philosophy seminar. His topic was The Meaning of Life. From this lecture he developed two main points for his future theories. The first was that life does not answer our questions about the meaning of life but rather puts those questions to us, leaving it for us to find the answers by deciding what we find meaningful. The second point was that the ultimate meaning of life is beyond the grasp of our intellect, but is something we only can live by, without ever being able to define it cognitively.
After the First World War, there were years of great soul-searching in Austria. Existential questions were on everyone’s mind and they all dealt with the meaning of life. It was at this time that Adler established a school of psychology that searched for concepts that would allow individual freedom. This attracted Frankl and the man who had once followed Freud’s theories began to form new concepts. He became a Social Democrat and in 1925 published Internatinale Zeitschrift fuer Individualpsychologie. Frankl became well known and well liked in this group. He soon began to develop ideas that were outside the traditional framework of Adler’s system of thinking. However, even until his death, Frankl felt an attachment to Adler’s Individual Psychology. The main difference in Logotherapy and Individual Psychology are views concerning the meaning of life.
In the 1930’s, Frankl developed new concepts and coined new terms. The term Logotherapy was first used in 1926 when Frankl presented a lecture at the Academic Society for Medical Psychology. He later used the term Existenzanalyse, (existential analysis) but this was later found to be confused with Binswanger’s Daseinsanalyse and Frankl went back to the term Logotherapy.
With the rise of Hitler, Frankl was taken to a concentration camp. Although he was stripped of everything, during this time he managed to write his book Aerztliche Seelsorge, later published in English as The Doctor and the Soul. This book contained the essence of Frankl’s thoughts and theories. Frankl considered this experience a validation of the concepts on which Logotherapy is based. The three tenets of Logotherapy were tested in the camps.
After being released from the concentration camps, Frankl became the head of the neurological department at the Poliklinik Hospital in Vienna. This time proved to be important in the development of Logotherapy. Frankl was able to practice and refine the methods of Logotherapy on thousands of patients. During the fifteen years after his release, Frankl continued to write and in the process refine, polish, strengthen and expand Logotherapy.
According to Frankl, the original term “Logotherapy” is derived from the Greek word, “logos”, which is defined as “meaning”. The word “therapy” deals with the treatment for disorders and maladjustment. Frankl’s concept is based on the premise that our primary motivational force is to find a meaning in our life.
Assumptions of Logotherapy
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Assumptions
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| The assumptions of Franklian Psychotherapy can neither be proved nor disproved with any certainty. This is also true with all psychotherapies. To see if these assumptions make sense in our lives we must assume that they are true. According to experiences of Logotherapist, these assumptions make sense. These assumptions include:1. The human being is an entity consisting of body, mind, and spirit.2. Life has meaning under all circumstances, even the most miserable.
3. People have a will to meaning. 4. People have freedom under all circumstances to activate the will to find meaning. 5. Life has a demand quality to which people must respond if decisions are to be meaningful. 6. The individual is unique. The first assumption deals with the body (soma), mind (psyche), and spirit (noos). According to Frankl, the body and mind are what we have and the spirit is what we are. Assumption two is “ultimate meaning”. This is difficult to grasp but it is something everyone experiences and it represents an order in a world with laws that go beyond human laws. The third assumption is seen as our main motivation for living and acting. When we see meaning we are ready for any type of suffering. This is considered to be different than our will to achieve power and pleasure. Assumption four is that we are free to activate our will to find meaning and this can be done under any circumstances. This deals with change of attitudes about unavoidable fate. Frankl was able to test the first four assumptions when he was confined in the concentration camps. The fifth assumption, the meaning of the moment, is more practical in daily living than ultimate meaning. Unlike ultimate meaning this meaning can be found and fulfilled. This can be done by following the values of society or by following the voice of our conscience. The sixth assumption deals with one’s sense of meaning. This is enhanced by the realization that we are irreplaceable. In essence, all humans are unique with an entity of body, mind and spirit. We all go through unique situations and are constantly looking to find meaning. We are free to do this at all times in response to certain demands.
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Zyklon B
ZYKLON B AS AN INSTRUMENT OF EXTERMINATION
- Zyklon B:
Hydrogen cyanide HCN, prussic acid, is a chemical compound in the form of a powerfully poisonous, volatile colorless liquid with the odor of bitter almonds. Prussic acid is considered a battlefield poison agent. Its action depends on the restraint of cellular respiration as a result of neutralizing the respiratory enzymes. Prussic acid passes through the mucous membranes and the skin, but principally through the lungs, into the blood. It blocks the process by which oxygen is released from red blood corpuscles and the result is a sort of internal asphyxiation. This is accompanied by symptoms of injury to the respiratory system, combined with a feeling of fear, dizziness and vomiting.
Zyklon B was used in Germany before and during the Second World War for disinfection and pest extermination in ships, buildings and machinery. In the Auschwitz concentration camp as well, it was used exclusively for sanitation and pest control until the summer of 1941. After the end of August 1941, Zyklon was used in the camp, first experimentally and then routinely, as an agent of mass annihilation. Zyklon B consisted of diatomite, in the form of granules the size of fine peas, saturated with prussic acid. In view of its volatility and the associated risk of accidental poisoning, it was supplied to the camp in sealed metal canisters.
The Zyklon used at Auschwitz concentration camp was produced by a firm called Degesch (Deutsche Gesellschaft für Schädlingsbekämpfung mbH), with headquarters in Frankfurt am Main and forming a part of IG Farbenindustrie.
Please see: http://www.auschwitz.org.pl/html/eng/historia_KL/cyklon_b_ok.html
Auschwitz Virtual Tour
Follow this link for a virtual tour of the Auschwitz concentration camp:
http://remember.org/auschwitz/index.html
If you access this page from a school computer, I suggest using the Flash version for each tour, as Quicktime does not appear to be installed or accessible on our server.
Tadeusz Borowski
(First name also transliterated as Theodore) Polish short story writer, poet, essayist, historian, and journalist.
INTRODUCTION
Borowski was one of the most lauded Polish fiction writers of the post-World War II era. He is best known for the English translations of his short stories, collected in This Way for the Gas, Ladies and Gentlemen, and Other Stories (1967), based on his experiences as an inmate of the Auschwitz concentration camp during World War II. Borowski’s Auschwitz stories are unique to the body of Holocaust literature because they focus as much on the persecutions and betrayals among prisoners as on the cruelties and inhumanity of the guards. Borowski’s narrator in many of these tales is a prisoner who has survived by securing a position of relative privilege within the camp system, aiding in the functioning of the Nazi death machine. Borowski’s tone is one of detachment as he relates the horrors of concentration camp life. Often, Borowski’s prose was extolled by critics for its profound sense of dissolution in relating the ineffable barbarism that characterized life and death at Auschwitz. Borowski’s uncompromising realism banishes heroic acts or redemptive lessons—his stories are bitter testimonies of human atrocity and baseness, effectively conveying the narrator’s responsibility to “bear witness” for those who did not survive the Holocaust.
Biographical Information
Borowski was born November 12, 1922, in Żytomierz, Poland, then part of the U.S.S.R. When he was four years old, his father was accused of political dissidence and sent to a labor camp in the Arctic. When Borowski was eight, his mother was sentenced to prison in Siberia, and he was put in the care of an aunt. In the late 1930s, shortly before the outbreak of World War II, Borowski was united with his parents, and the family moved to Warsaw. After Nazi forces invaded Poland during World War II, Poles were forbidden from obtaining any education; Borowski, of college age, began to attend clandestine courses at Warsaw University. During this time, his first volume of poetry was illegally published and distributed by an underground press. Shortly after, Borowski and his fiancée were arrested by the Gestapo for political dissidence. They were placed at various prison camps until finally they were sent to Auschwitz. Their lives were spared only because three weeks before their arrival the SS had changed its policy to exempt non-Jews from execution. Borowski became a hospital orderly at the camp, thus earning various minor privileges. Other duties took him into the women’s area of the camp, where Borowski was able to see his fiancée. Toward the end of the war, Borowski and his fiancée were moved to another camp, Dachau, from which they were liberated by Allied forces in 1945. In 1946, now married, they returned to Warsaw, where Borowski began to publish volumes of short prose pieces based on his experiences during and after the war. In 1948, he became a Stalinist and staunch supporter of the Communist Party in Poland. He worked for the Secret Police and wrote pro-Communist propaganda pieces. The details of Borowski’s death are ironic: having survived Auschwitz, Borowski, in July of 1951, committed suicide by turning on the gas oven in his apartment and asphyxiating himself.
Major Works of Short Fiction
Borowski’s most widely celebrated short fiction is the volume This Way for the Gas, Ladies and Gentlemen, and Other Stories, which includes translations of his stories originally published in the late 1940s. This collection of short stories is based on Borowski’s experiences in Auschwitz during World War II. His other major story collection is Pozegnanie z Maria (1948). Borowski’s fiction is frequently categorized as literature of atrocity—works inspired by mass crimes against humanity committed during the twentieth century. More specifically, his stories are often discussed as Holocaust literature. Borowski’s fiction is unique among works of Holocaust literature in its focus on daily life in the concentration camp, particularly through portrayal of the betrayals and persecutions the prisoners themselves employed to survive. Jan Kott, in an introduction to This Way for the Gas, Ladies and Gentlemen, quoted Borowski’s charge to those survivors of Nazi concentration camps who would write of their experiences: “The first duty of Auschwitzers is to make clear just what a camp is. … But let them not forget that the reader will unfailingly ask: But how did it happen that you survived? … Tell, then, how you bought places in the hospital, easy posts, how you shoved the ‘Moslems’ [prisoners who had lost the will to live] into the oven, how you bought women, men, what you did in the barracks, unloading the transports … tell about the daily life of the camp. … But write that you, you were the ones who did this. That a portion of the sad fame of Auschwitz belongs to you as well.” Unlike other works of fiction to emerge from survivors of Nazi concentration camps, Borowski’s stories lack any heroic martyrdom or redemptive morality, offering only a stark realism. Irving Howe, in the New Republic (1986), commented that in these stories, “Borowski writes in a cold, harsh, even coarse style, heavy with flaunted cynicism, and offering no reliefs of the heroic.” Howe added that Borowski’s stand-in and central character throughout these stories, Kapo Taduesz, “works not only with but on behalf of the death system.” Andrzej Wirth, in Polish Review (1967), noted, “In the Auschwitz cycle [of Borowski's fiction] the narrators have certain features in common. In each case he is a victim collaborating in crime. Within the system of extermination he has found a comparatively comfortable position of a mediator between victims and their tormentors and plays this role with relish.” Borowski focused on the ways in which extremes of persecution can result in the corruption of the victims as much as the perpetrators. In one story, a Jewish woman at Auschwitz refuses to acknowledge her own child, as it walks behind her yelling, “Mama! Mama! … don’t leave me!,” because she is afraid she will be killed if the SS guards see that she is a mother. While Borowski conveys the inhumanity of those who run the concentration camp, he is no less harsh in his depiction of the cruelty and betrayal that the inmates perpetrate upon each other. The protagonist in many of these stories is, much like Borowski himself, one of the camp inmates who manages to survive by securing for himself a post with which he assists in the functioning of the death camp, leaving the narrator passive in the face of mass murder. Borowski’s prose details an inability of the individual to challenge the bloody reality of the camp, allowing a surreal mixture of normative leisure activities with grim slaughter. In “The People Who Walked On,” for example, the main character notes that, while he plays soccer in a field near the gas chambers, “right behind my back, 3,000 people had been put to death.”
Critical Reception
Mark Shechner, in the Nation (1976), described Borowski’s prose as “some of the most lucid and powerful testimony we have about life in the house of death.” As John Thompson, in Commentary (1967), asserted, Borowski, in This Way for the Gas, Ladies and Gentlemen, “tells the most horrible tales the human race has ever had to hear about itself since time began.” Neal Ascherson, in the New York Review of Books (1976), described Borowski as “the most astonishing young writer in Poland to emerge after the war.” Borowski’s first short stories about his concentration camp experiences, “This Way for the Gas, Ladies and Gentlemen” and “A Day at Harmenz,” were published in Poland before he returned from Europe after being liberated. Kott asserted that these stories “produced quite a shock” to a Polish public that expected to read “martyrologies”; Borowski was thus “accused of amorality, decadence, and nihilism.” Kott added, however, that “at the same time it was clear to everyone that Polish literature had gained a dazzling new talent.”
Critics have often commented on the unique tone of Borowski’s Auschwitz stories, noting that they convey the unspeakable horror and hopelessness of the concentration camp through a narrative voice which, on the surface, seems isolated and unmoved by the daily machinations of the Nazi death machine. As Kott commented, “The most terrifying thing in Borowski’s stories is the icy detachment of the author.” Howe attributed the impact of these stories to Borowski’s narrative voice, which conveys “his absolute refusal to strike any note of redemptive nobility.” Many commentators have observed that Borowski’s unique narrative tone relays the burden of a survivor’s responsibility to “bear witness” or “give testimony” in speaking for the many who did not survive the camps. Kott described the significance of Borowski’s fiction as related to literature of atrocity as such: “Among the tens of thousands of pages written about the holocaust and the death camps, Borowski’s slender book continues to occupy, for more than a quarter century now, a place apart. The book is one of the cruelest testimonies to what men did to men, and a pitiless verdict that anything can be done to a human being.”
