Stefan Gąsiorowski

The article discusses twenty-five years of the existence of the academic journal Studia Judaica. Semi-annual which is an organ of the Polish Association for Jewish Studies. First, it is presented how the association itself was created, and then the periodical was founded. Next, it describes where the subsequent offices of the journal’s editorial office were located, who published the journal, and the composition of its editorial staff. Moreover, general information on the authors of the texts appearing in this periodical, their subject matter, and their reviewers are summarized. Finally, the focus is placed on the financial situation of Studia Judaica as well as its general condition and plans for the future.

This article details the history of Karaim Literature Wednesday, an event which took place on November 9, 1932 in the “Room of Konrad” of the Basilian monastery on Ostrobramska street in Vilnius. It was one of 371 popular and authoritative weekly events organized during the interwar period by the Vilnius Branch of the Polish Writers Labour Union. During this event, Hachan Seraja Szapszał – the leader of Polish Karaims – gave a lecture on the history and culture of his nation, after which several Karaim songs were sung by Walentyna and Halina Łobanosówny, accompanied by Lidia Szole on the piano. The songs were broadcast by the Vilnius Radio, and aroused great interest among the listeners. Using source material from the private archive of Józef Sulimowicz in Warsaw, I have attempted to recreate Karaim Literature Wednesday, in particular the diversity, origin and richness of Karaim songs. The annex to this article contains the original lyrics to 19 Karaim songs written in the Karaim language, most of which were sung at the event. 

*Rozszerzony tekst referatu pt. „Karaimska Środa Literacka w Wilnie w 1932 roku” wygłoszonego na międzynarodowej konferencji naukowej „Karei Europae Orientalis” w Poznaniu 13 I 2017 r. Dziękuję serdecznie dr Annie Sulimowicz-Keruth i Marioli Abkowicz za cenne uwagi do niniejszego tekstu. 

This article discusses the early life of Maksymilian Boruchowicz (1911–1987), a Jewish writer, publicist, and literary critic known in interwar Kraków, who changed his name to Michał Borwicz after the Second World War. Biographical information on his life before the outbreak of the war focuses mainly on his studies of Polish language and literature at the Jagiellonian University, where he was actively involved in student literary and cultural circles, as well as political journalism. During his studies and immediately thereafter, Borwicz published prolifically in various magazines and literary journals, and before the war published the novel Miłość i rasa (Love and Race), which was received positively by literary critics.

Monastery chronicles from the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth provide valuable insight not only into the history of individual orders and the Polish clergy in general, but also into the history of mentality, daily life and religious and ethnic minorities. Although references to Jews are rather sporadic in such chronicles, they are nevertheless quite diverse and concern almost all aspects of Jewish activity in Poland and abroad. Therefore, they can serve as an excellent complement to other sources in the field, including Jewish ones, and those of various secular institutions and offices. It should be noted, however, that the credibility of the information contained in monastery chronicles is always  dependent on the distance in time and space between the chronicler and the described events and should—if possible—be verified against other documentary sources from the same period.