English
Polish
Witold Pilecki. Confrontation with the legend of the “volunteer to Auschwitz”
Ewa Cuber-Strutyńska
redakcja@holocaustresearch.pl Biohistoryczka, absolwentka studiów doktoranckich w Instytucie Historii Uniwersytetu Pedagogicznego im. KEN w Krakowie. Autorka artykułów naukowych dotyczących historii KL Auschwitz, Holokaustu oraz współczesnych konfliktów zbrojnych. Przygotowuje dysertację doktorską na temat form pomocy udzielanej więźniom KL Auschwitz przez osoby duchowne
https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6259-7960
Institute of History, Pedagogical University in Krakow
Zagłada Żydów. Studia i Materiały, No. 10 (2014), pages: 474-494
Publication date: 2014-12-01
Abstract
This article is an attempt to analyse the historical memory of Witold Pilecki functioning in the reference literature and collective consciousness. The author concentrates on their idealising and simplistic elements, which lead to mythologization of Pilecki, and asks about the genesis and purpose of creation of myths about the Captain. Basing on an analysis of the sources, Cuber-Strutyńska questions the legitimacy of the two popular expressions used with regard to Pilecki, that is, “volunteer to Auschwitz” and “the author of the first report about the Holocaust.” In this way the author points out the necessity to correct and supplement Pilecki’s biography by means of a careful and cautious analysis of all the available sources.
Keywords
Witold Pilecki, Captain Pilecki, volunteer to Auschwitz, Pilecki’s report, Report “W”
License
Copyright (c) 2010 Zagłada Żydów. Studia i Materiały
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0
Other articles by the same auhtor(s)
- Ewa Cuber-Strutyńska, Witold Pilecki. Confronting the legend of the “volunteer to Auschwitz” , Zagłada Żydów. Studia i Materiały: No. Holocaust Studies and Materials (2017)
