Selected text
During the March events of 1968 [see Gomulka Campaign] [35], a sort of proscription list was in circulation, which included the names of all the Jews. My name was added at the bottom.
That fact shows that they had a problem with my case because of my service with the Home Army and because I wasn’t an old-guard communist, but in the end they added my name as well.
Later I was barred from the meetings of the editorial team and subjected to all possible harassments. My salary was also cut. I was very good friends with Michal Lucki, a very talented reporter, who couldn’t bear the situation any more and decided to emigrate.
The editor-in-chief of Trybuna Ludu called me in and asked whether or not I intended to go. I said: ‘No, I can tell you right away that the only crime I will commit in Poland is that if you throw me out, I will slip back over the border illegally.’
Some of my colleagues at Trybuna Ludu behaved very decently towards me, but others didn’t. I must say that the openness, intensity, and sheer boorishness of the anti-Semitic campaign surpassed my wildest expectations.
As far as the official anti-Semitism cultivated by the PRL [the Polish Communist state] and the PZPR is concerned, I think that the main danger it represents has to do with the fact that the generation of protagonists of that campaign is still around in public life.
That fact shows that they had a problem with my case because of my service with the Home Army and because I wasn’t an old-guard communist, but in the end they added my name as well.
Later I was barred from the meetings of the editorial team and subjected to all possible harassments. My salary was also cut. I was very good friends with Michal Lucki, a very talented reporter, who couldn’t bear the situation any more and decided to emigrate.
The editor-in-chief of Trybuna Ludu called me in and asked whether or not I intended to go. I said: ‘No, I can tell you right away that the only crime I will commit in Poland is that if you throw me out, I will slip back over the border illegally.’
Some of my colleagues at Trybuna Ludu behaved very decently towards me, but others didn’t. I must say that the openness, intensity, and sheer boorishness of the anti-Semitic campaign surpassed my wildest expectations.
As far as the official anti-Semitism cultivated by the PRL [the Polish Communist state] and the PZPR is concerned, I think that the main danger it represents has to do with the fact that the generation of protagonists of that campaign is still around in public life.
Period
Interview
Ludwik Krasucki