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NEXT STORY

1970: the intelligentsia remained silent

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Intelligentsia fails to support the workers
Jan Józef Lipski Social activist
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Wszyscy wiedzą, że podstawowym elementem tego, co się tam działo i to co pozostało takim ciężkim wspomnieniem i dla robotników, i dla inteligentów to było to, że inteligencja nie poparła tego ruchu. Zapewne byli może poszczególni ludzie, którzy na te... na ulice wyszli razem z robotnikami, ale nie warto się zastanawiać nad tym, ilu takich było, natomiast istotne było to, że środowiska inteligenckie nie wzięły udziału w tym ruchu. Studenci po prostu zamknęli się w domach akademickich, rozgoryczeni być może tym, że w ‘68 roku robotnicy ich nie poparli, być może, no niemniej jednak faktem jest jedno – że zostali. Reakcji nie było prawie żadnych. Ja muszę powiedzieć, że próbowałem czegoś i wyobrażam sobie, że gdyby w tym momencie na przykład był na wolności Jacek Kuroń, to on przy swoich pewnych zarówno talentach działacza, jak i znacznie większej ode mnie energii w działaniu, by może coś zmontował. Trzeba pamiętać, że jeszcze wielu ludzi siedziało w więzieniach z ruchu marcowego w tym czasie. Ja pamiętam, że ja próbowałem coś... zmontować list intelektualistów, co się na samym wstępie skończyło niepowodzeniem. I tu... przyszedłem do pani Marii Ossowskiej, pani Ossowska powiedziała: „No dobrze, ale my nie wiemy tak dokładnie, co się dzieje, ale wie Pan, ale będziemy wiedzieli, bo właśnie przyjechał Jurek Kreczmar z Wybrzeża. On tam reżyserował coś i tego... i pozwolono mu na wyjazd i wrócił, i się dowiemy”. No i to było coś fatalnego, dlatego że pan Jurek Kreczmar cały czas zamknięty, tam w teatrze i na wszelki wypadek nie wychodząc na ulicę, widział przez okna teatru odcinek, gdzie niby no coś się trochę działo, ale ani trochę nie przypominało tego, co tam naprawdę było – nie widział tych trupów, tej krwi, tych masowych demonstracji, widział drobne patrole milicyjne do których kilkunastoletni chłopcy rzucają kamieniami, a ci im wygrażają. I to wszystko, co widział. I pani Maria powiedziała: „No jednak, Panie Janku, no, to nam nie wystarczy. Może jeszcze się czegoś więcej dowiemy, no, ale to jest jedyny świadek, który... który widział, który...”. Pan Kreczmar... oczywiście, ja nie stawiam mu zarzutów, działał w najlepszej wierze, no po prostu powiedział to, co widział.

Everyone knows that basically what was happening there was that the intelligentsia didn't support this movement, and that is a painful memory for both the workers and the intelligentsia. There must have been individual people who took to the streets alongside the workers but it's not even worth thinking about how many people there were who did that. What does matter, however, is that the intelligentsia didn't take part in this movement. The students simply locked themselves away in their halls of residence; perhaps they felt resentful towards the workers for not supporting them in ‘68, but the fact was that they didn't join the protest. There was very little reaction to this and I have to say that I tried something and I imagine if, for example, Jacek Kuroń had not been in prison, with his talents as an activist and his energy which was far greater than mine, perhaps he could have put something together. Don't forget that a great many people were still locked up at that time following the events of March. I remember that I tried to arrange something, a letter from intellectuals but this was a disaster from the start. I came to Mrs Maria Ossowska…  said, ‘Well, you know we don't really know what's going on but we should find out soon because Jurek Kreczmar has just arrived from the coast. He was directing something there and so he was allowed to leave and now he's come back so we'll find out what's happening from him’. This was dreadful because Mr Jurek Kreczmar had been shut up in the theatre all the time and hadn't gone out onto the street just in case so he'd only seen the odd thing through the window which in no way corresponded to what was really happening out there. He didn't see the bodies, the blood, the mass demonstrations, he only saw a few youths who'd been pelting the odd police patrol with stones being threatened by the policemen, and that was all he'd seen. And Mrs Maria Ossowska said, ‘Well, we need more than that. Perhaps we'll find out more but he's the only witness who saw anything’. I don't want to cast any aspersions on Mr Kreczmar, he acted in good faith, but he could only tell us what he had seen.

Jan Józef Lipski (1926-1991) was one of Poland's best known political activists. He was also a writer and a literary critic. As a soldier in the Home Army (Armia Krajowa), he fought in the Warsaw Uprising. In 1976, following worker protests, he co-founded the Workers' Defence Committee (KOR). His active opposition to Poland's communist authorities led to his arrest and imprisonment on several occasions. In 1987, he re-established and headed the Polish Socialist Party. Two years later, he was elected to the Polish Senate. He died in 1991 while still in office. For his significant work, Lipski was honoured with the Cross of the Valorous (Krzyż Walecznych), posthumously with the Grand Cross of the Order of Polonia Restituta (1991) and with the highest Polish decoration, the Order of the White Eagle (2006).

Listeners: Jacek Petrycki Marcel Łoziński

Cinematographer Jacek Petrycki was born in Poznań, Poland in 1948. He has worked extensively in Poland and throughout the world. His credits include, for Agniezka Holland, Provincial Actors (1979), Europe, Europe (1990), Shot in the Heart (2001) and Julie Walking Home (2002), for Krysztof Kieslowski numerous short films including Camera Buff (1980) and No End (1985). Other credits include Journey to the Sun (1998), directed by Jesim Ustaoglu, which won the Golden Camera 300 award at the International Film Camera Festival, Shooters (2000) and The Valley (1999), both directed by Dan Reed, Unforgiving (1993) and Betrayed (1995) by Clive Gordon both of which won the BAFTA for best factual photography. Jacek Petrycki is also a teacher and a filmmaker.

Film director Marcel Łoziński was born in Paris in 1940. He graduated from the Film Directing Department of the National School of Film, Television and Theatre in Łódź in 1971. In 1994, he was nominated for an American Academy Award and a European Film Academy Award for the documentary, 89 mm from Europe. Since 1995, he has been a member of the American Academy of Motion Picture Art and Science awarding Oscars. He lectured at the FEMIS film school and the School of Polish Culture of Warsaw University. He ran documentary film workshops in Marseilles. Marcel Łoziński currently lectures at Andrzej Wajda’s Master School for Film Directors. He also runs the Dragon Forum, a European documentary film workshop.

Tags: Jacek Kuroń, Maria Ossowska, Jerzy Kreczmar

Duration: 3 minutes, 6 seconds

Date story recorded: October 1989

Date story went live: 11 March 2011