The Debrief

A group of eleven young Ukrainian women have launched an art zine in Warsaw called ‘3ina’, which brings together works from across Ukraine and beyond in a magazine whose sales will support the Ukrainian cause.

For this episode of The Debrief, host John Beauchamp speaks to Julia from Grupa Wolne, a Polish NGO which fights against social exclusion and which funded ‘3ina’. Also we have Polina in the studio, while Oksana joins us on the line from Kharkiv.

Is it possible to create art while your country is at war? How did the ‘3ina’ team come up with the idea, and how was it made possible? All that and more in this episode.

Wisława Szymborska, a Polish poet who was awarded the Nobel Prize for literature in 1996, would have been celebrating her 100th birthday in 2023.

The poet died in 2012, but her legacy continues thanks to the Szymborska Foundation. The organisation is run by the poet’s former secretary, Michał Rusinek, himself a writer.

In this episode of The Debrief, Michał Rusinek is in the studio with host John Beauchamp to go through what’s in store for the Szymborska Year – as it is officially known.

More on the Szymborska Foundation can be found here.

More on the Audionomia Foundation’s Szymborska Audio Competition can be found here. [PL]

Michał Rusinek (L) with host John Beauchamp at the studio in Warsaw

In this episode of The Debrief, we hear about plans to make a film based on the life of the Midwife of Auschwitz, Stanisława Leszczyńska.

Leszczyńska was a Polish midwife who delivered over 3,000 children while a prisoner in the Auschwitz concentration camp. Now a feature film is to be made about the experience.

In the studio John Beauchamp hears from Dagmara Leszczkowicz, Editor-in-Chief of TFN and who is involved with the film.

We also hear about plans for the TFN this year: apart from the latest news from Poland, have you checked out our TikTok yet?

In this week’s episode we are going to be hearing from two guests from the Polin Museum of the History of Polish Jews about a number of events taking place throughout the year.

The phrase: “Don’t be indifferent” was said during a speech given by Holocaust survivor Marian Turski at the 75th anniversary of the liberation of the Nazi German Auschwitz concentration camp in 2020.

The phrase forms the inspiration for this year’s programme at the Polin Museum of the History of Polish Jews, which is commemorating 80 years since the Ghetto Uprising of 1943.

This year’s events “will recall the life stories of those who, against despair, loneliness, starvation, thirst and fear fought for ‘every day, every hour, every minute’ of staying alive with their nearest and dearest,” underlines a statement from Polin. “[We] will also pose questions about our future.”

Host John Beauchamp is joined by Zuzanna Schnepf-Kołacz, curator of the “Around Us a Sea of Fire” exhibition and Polin spokeswoman Marta Dziewulska.

• “Thou Shalt Not Be Indifferent. 80th Anniversary of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising” programme [EN]
• A unique discovery – photographic film with images of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising [EN]
• Information on how to join the Daffodil campaign [PL]

It’s great to be back in the studio after some unexpected time off after I came down with Covid at the end of 2022. I’m now back on my feet and we are kicking off our fourth season here at The Debrief with a slight change of style, you might have noticed our funky new jingle!

Host John Beauchamp joins Sapir Librowski-Sher, a Hebrew teacher at the Jagiellonian University in Kraków. Originally from Tel Aviv, we hear of how she came to Poland and what it’s like for her to get in touch with her Polish-Jewish roots.

Jewish studies at the Jagiellonian University.

The book mentioned in the episode is Conversations with an Executioner by Kazimierz Moczarski.

One of the ways we can perceive and define a city is by the way it smells. New research spotlights historical smells and – more importantly – what was done about them, in the Polish city of Lublin.

Research from Dr Stephanie Weismann – originally from the University of Vienna, currently at the Institute of Polish Culture at Warsaw University – takes into account four case studies of Lublin’s smells over a number of decades in the 20th century.

At Warsaw University she’s going one step further with a study of smells in a project called “NoseWise. An Olfactory Approach Towards Polish Cultural History”.

So how does one go about recording smells? Join host John Beauchamp in this episode of The Debrief to find out.

A new online project brings the Drohobycz of Polish-Jewish writer Bruno Schulz back to life through reimagined immersive soundscapes and narratives.

Bruno Schulz was born in Drohobych, in what is now Ukraine, in 1892. He is widely regarded as one of the great Polish-language writers of the 20th century, having received a number of awards in the 1930s.

His literary career was cut short by World War II. When Nazi troops moved into Drohobych, he was forced into the newly-created ghetto, and was shot dead by a Gestapo officer in 1942.

Host John Beauchamp speaks to artist Mika Johnson about the project, called The Republic of Dreams, which is available here.

With the war in Ukraine entering the winter months, hope still holds out for a decisive victory.

Host John Beauchamp speaks to journalist and war reporter Agnieszka Pospiszyl on her recent month-long tour of Ukraine, including the liberation of Kherson from the Russians.

“It’s not a question of if, it’s a question of when,” Pospiszyl says of a Ukrainian success.

In this episode of The Debrief, we take a look at a virtual exhibition at the Polin Museum of the History of Polish Jews in Warsaw which gives users the opportunity to dive into the world of Jewish cooking.

We take a look at the history of Jewish cuisine in Poland, from the kosher cookbooks of the 19th century right up until the present day and how vegan culture – which has taken hold in Warsaw – is inextricably linked to Jewish cuisine from Tel Aviv.

Host John Beauchamp speaks to Barbara Kirshenblatt-Gimblett, Chief Curator of the Core Exhibition at Polin, about the history of Jewish cuisine in Poland and beyond.

You can check out the virtual exhibition as well as pick some Jewish recipes here.

An exhibition which highlights the history of the Gdańsk shipyard from its early days in the 19th century is on at the European Solidarity Centre.

The famous Gdańsk shipyard is well known in Poland and abroad for being the birthplace of Solidarity, the trade union led by electrician Lech Wałęsa which ultimately took down the communist regime.

However, Gdańsk has been home to a shipyard for far longer, with the Prussians setting up a base in Danzig in 1844 and turning the site into a shipyard to provide corvettes and U-boats for the German navy, including the U-20, which sank the Lusitania in 1915…

Host John Beauchamp is taken on a whirlwind tour of the exhibitions with Magdalena Charkin-Jaszcza from the European Solidarity Centre.

You can find out more about the ECS here and the Shipyard exhibition here.