Henryk Grynberg

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Henryk Grynberg (born in 1936 in Warsaw) was a Polish writer and actor who survived the Nazi occupation. He was an award-winning novelist, short-story writer, poet, playwright and essayist who had authored twenty books of prose and poetry and two dramas. Grynberg, known as the “chronicler of the fate of the Polish Jews”, tackled in his writings the Holocaust experience and the post-Holocaust trauma.^[1]^[2]

1 Personal survival
2 Collaboration with Communists
3 The beginnings of a writer
4 Works and achievements
5 References
- 5.1 Specific
- 5.2 General

[edit] Personal survival

Grynberg and his mother were the only survivors from their family. He spent the years 1942 to 1944 in hiding places. After the war, he lived in Łódź and Warsaw.^[2]

[edit] Collaboration with Communists

On 11th October 1956 he signed as an undercovered agent of the 7th Department of Polish Agency for Internal Security- code name "reporter". (documented by Polish Historical Institute and published at "Zycie Warszawy" on 1 December 2006). Grynberg was pressured by the SB, denied that he informed on any one, and reportedly revealed his recruitment to the FBI. See Ted Lipien <http://www.freemediaonline.org/communist_spy_scandals_at_voa_and_rfe_112265.htm>

[edit] The beginnings of a writer

In 1959, Grynberg graduated from Warsaw University with a master’s degree in journalism. As an actor, Grynberg had connections with the Jewish State Theater company in Warsaw. It was during this time when he started publishing prose and poetry.^[1]^[2]

While the Jewish State Theater company was on tour in the United States in late 1967, he refused to return to Poland. This defection was an act of protest against the communist regime's anti-Jewish propaganda, and against the censorship of his writings. ^[1]^[2]

In 1971, after two years of attending graduate studies at UCLA, Grynberg received an M.A. in Russian Literature and moved to Washington, D.C., where Grynberg worked for the U.S. Information Agency (particularly for Voice in America) for a period of twenty years.^[1]

[edit] Works and achievements

Grynberg published his first story in 1959, which was later included in his debut collection, The Antigone Crew in 1963. His works - both while in Poland and in the United States – Grynberg narrated the stories of “those who died during the war and of those who survived to live afterwards in Lodz, Warsaw, or New York, struggling to come to terms with their own memory and with the fact that others did not remember.” His works were also described as characteristically abundant in “biographical and autobiographical material”, where his Jewish protagonists are the narrators whose personal experiences were “supplemented by the experiences of other ‘survivors’”.^[2]

Grynberg was a recipient of all major Polish literary prizes. He also contributed to the Polish press and English-language journals. His essays and articles appeared in publications such as the Commentary, the Midstream, and the Soviet-Jewish Affairs in London. Grynberg’s novels had been published in English translation, namely: Child of the Shadows (Vallentine Mitchell, London, 1969); the sequel, The Victory (Northwestern University Press, 1993) and the documentary book, Children of Zion (Northwestern University Press, January 1998, translated by Jacqueline Mitchell).^[1]^[3]

Grynberg's books were also translated into the French, German, Italian, Hebrew and Dutch languages.^[1]

Grynberg's 2004 book Uchodźcy (Refugees) was nominated for Poland's Nike Literary Award in 2005.^[2]