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My parents go their separate ways

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Determined to stay in Poland
Aleksander Smolar Political scientist
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And I decided to stay in Poland with a deep conviction. I decided to stay in Poland. Yet at the same time, I had a feeling which I've already mentioned, a sense that this lacked purpose and that only academic work or intellectual thought or else my public or political engagement, could give it this purpose. Academic work was impossible as I'd been expelled from the university and I could only work there after hours – I had to earn money to survive. I considered that engagement in public life was, because of the atmosphere in the country and the attitude towards people like me, namely Jews and people of Jewish origin, impossible. Undertaking any activity in Poland… it would have harmed any activity so I decided to stay, although essentially I was postponing a decision which was inevitable – to leave not because as I've already said, out of fear – I mean, I wasn't afraid of potential repression. And here again there are models that I had before me although the matter was quite different – models I had from home and the way that my mind worked – everything was in favour of me staying however, I had a sense that I had lost my objective.

[Q] Did you talk about this with your friends, your wife, your parents…?

No, my wife… my already ex-wife – she'd left a year earlier, she'd left with my brother and our daughter and had gone to live in Sweden. No, there were no conversations, it was a decision which I took alone.

O, i postanowiłem zostać w Polsce w takim głębokim przekonaniu. Postanowiłem zostać w Polsce. Chociaż równocześnie z takim poczuciem, o którym mówiłem, braku poczucia sensu, to znaczy ten sens... ten sens mogła nadać tylko praca naukowa, refleksja intelektualna i z drugiej strony zaangażowanie publiczne czy polityczne. Praca naukowa była niemożliwa ze względu na to, że byłem wyrzucony z uniwersytetu i tam mogłem najwyżej po godzinach pracy... musiałem zarabiać też na życie. Zaangażowanie publiczne uznawałem – ze względu na atmosferę w kraju i ze względu na stosunek do ludzi takich jak ja, czyli, innymi słowy, Żydów czy pochodzenia żydowskiego – za niemożliwe: że wszelkie podejmowanie działania w Polsce – że to byłoby szkodliwe dla wszelkich... więc innymi słowy, postanowiłem zostać, chociaż w istocie było to odroczeniem decyzji, która była nieuchronna – o wyjeździe. Nie ze względu, jak już o tym mówiłem, nie ze względu na obawy – to znaczy, nie bałem się możliwości prześladowań. Znów – tutaj wzory wyniesione, chociaż dla innej zupełnie sprawy, wyniesione z domu i moja konstrukcja psychiczna – wszystko... wszystko to przemawiałoby na rzecz pozostania, natomiast miałem poczucie utraty celu.

[Q] Były dyskusje z przyjaciółmi, z żoną, z rodzicami...?

Nie, no żona... już była moja żona – wyjechała rok wcześniej, wyjechała z moim bratem i z naszą córką do Szwecji. Nie, nie było dyskusji, to była decyzja, którą ja sam podjąłem.

Aleksander Smolar (b. 1940) is a Polish writer, political activist and adviser, vice-president of the Institute for Human Sciences and president of the Stefan Batory Foundation.

Listeners: Vitek Tracz

Vitek Tracz is a London-based entrepreneur who has been involved in science publishing, pharmaceutical information and mobile phone-based navigation.

Tags: Poland

Duration: 2 minutes, 6 seconds

Date story recorded: September 2017

Date story went live: 20 December 2018