Franciszka Arnsztajnowa

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Franciszka Arnsztajnowa : biography

19 February 1865 – 1942

Antisemitic attacks on Arnsztajnowa

In 1910 and 1911 Arnsztajnowa was the object of a book boycott motivated by antisemitic sentiment and spearheaded by the Endecja circles.Hanna Mortkowicz-Olczakowa (see Hanna Mortkowicz-Olczakowa), "Na pięterku" (Up the Little Flight of Stairs), Kamena (Lublin), vol. 27, No. 18 (208), 30 September 1960, pp. 1 & 4. As a first-hand testimonial, this is one of the major primary sources for the biography of Arnsztajnowa.

In the summer of 1937 Arnsztajnowa, then a 72-year-old grande dame of Polish literature (a recipient of the Silver Laurel of the Polish Academy of Literature and a decorated veteran of the Polish war of independence), was the victim of antisemitic attacks from the Endecja literary circles connected with the literary magazine Prosto z mostu of Warsaw, a publication billing itself in the masthead as an artistic-literary weekly, edited and published by Stanisław Piasecki (19001941). In its edition of 25 July 1937 the magazine in question carried a quasi-anonymous racist and in parts scurrilously versified polemic signed only "(st. p.)" (which would have been universally understood by readers to refer to Piasecki) in which Arnsztajnowa was called, sarcastically, the "erector of the edifice of the Polish language" (sc., one of the primary forces shaping the mother tongue) without being Polish. Although other Polish writers of Jewish descent were held up to ridicule by name as well, Arnsztajnowa was selected for special treatment. "Consider this efflorescence of Polish speech from under the aegis of Arnsztajnowa", jeered the writer of the article, presenting his readers with a sentence taken out of context from one of Arnsztajnowa’s articles (on the complex subject of the phenomenology of contemporary French culture), which was supposed to offend against linguistic norm (it had, in fact, a typographical error involving the omission of a single letter). The attack on Arnsztajnowa continued under the guise of an attack on Ludwik Fryde (19121942), despite his young age already a distinguished literary critic of Jewish descent, whose surname was altered to "frydek" so that it might rhyme with żydek ("the little jew", the lower-case initials employed for their added insulting value) while the author went on: "so it is among us that every common-or-garden pederast, if he has talent, he bandies it about", etc.(st. p.) [sic: lower-case initials in parentheses], "Wycinanki" (Newspaper Cuttings), Prosto z mostu (see Prosto z mostu) (Warsaw), vol. 3, No. 34 (142), 25 July 1937, p. 5. The title of the periodical, Prosto z mostu, is a Polish idiomatic expression meaning "without beating about the bush", "straightforwardly", "point-blank". The incident generated a groundswell of support for her from the Polish reading public, including an open letter signed by many writers and poets, some of whom also published individual expressions of support as did, for example, Józef Łobodowski, calling the attack “outrageous and revolting”.Józef Łobodowski, "W obronie zasługi" (In Defence of Merit), letter to the editor, Wiadomości Literackie (see Wiadomości Literackie) (Warsaw), vol. 14, No. 32 (718), 1 August 1937, p. 8.

After Łobodowski’s protest published in the most prestigious literary journal of the interbellum epoch, the Wiadomości Literackie, Piasecki remained unrepentant, and a fresh antisemitic attack on Arnsztajnowa was printed with additional vitriol in the Prosto z mostu edition of 8 August 1937.st. p.) [sic: lower-case initials in parentheses, with the left parenthesis missing], "Wycinanki" (Newspaper Cuttings), Prosto z mostu (see Prosto z mostu) (Warsaw), vol. 3, No. 37 (145), 8 August 1937, p. 8. The antisemitic and homophobic attack on Arnsztajnowa and others was originally authored by Jerzy Pietrkiewicz and published in the ultra-nationalist and antisemitic periodical Myśl Narodowa ("National Thought"), but Prosto z mostu went beyond the text of the original racist pasquinade in its attempt to disseminate, defend and justify it.Jerzy Pietrkiewicz, "W rozmównicy" (In the Chat Room), Myśl Narodowa (Warsaw), vol. 17, No. 29, 18 July 1937, p. 458. For its part Myśl Narodowa will continue its attack on Arnsztajnowa on other fronts, bemoaning (in its issue of 29 August 1937) "the pernicious Jewish dispensation (gospodarka żydów) in the field of literature" for which the evidence was to be the supposed falsification by Niemirowska and Arnsztajnowa of Kipling (through their alleged toning down or expurgation of antisemitic passages in the works of this author).T. R. [sic: anonymous article], "Nauka i literatura: Rocznik Literacki" (Sciences and Literature: The Literary Annual), Myśl Narodowa (Warsaw), vol. 17, No. 35, 29 August 1937, p. 552.