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Henryk Sienkiewiczâ•Žs Output and Literary Censorship in The ACTAACTA UNIVERSITATIS UNIVERSITATIS LODZIENSIS LODZIENSIS ACTA UNIVERSITATIS LODZIENSIS FoliaFolia Litteraria Litteraria Polonica Polonica 3(58) 2(57) 2020 2020 Folia Litteraria Polonica 2(57) 2020 http://dx.doi.org/10.18778/1505-9057.58.22http://dx.doi.org/10.18778/1505-9057.57.01 http://dx.doi.org/10.18778/1505-9057.57.01 * MarekMarcinMarcin Rajch* K ępińskiKępiński* https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4367-3224 https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4367-3224https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0194-8699 HenrykTheThe wall wall Sienkiewicz’s of of silence silence surrounding surroundingoutput and literary censorshipliteratureliterature and inand theremembrance: remembrance: DDR VarlamVarlam Shalamov’sShalamov’s ArtificialArtificial Limbs, Limbs, Etc. Etc. Asas oneas a could am metaphordiscover,etaphor based on of the of DDRthe the censorship soviet soviet documents empire empire stored in German archives, one of the first attempts at publishing Henryk Sienkiewicz’s works in the still relatively young East German state was undertaken by the Neues Leben The camp solitary confinement block was old and decrepit. It looked as if a wall publishingThe camp house. solitary It began confinement its operations block inwas 1946 old andand wasdecrepit. one ofIt thelooked first as ifpublishing a wall might fall down, the whole block crumble, and the beams collapse, if you just housesmight created fall down, by the the new whole state blockauthorities. crumble, Formally, and the it beams was part collapse, of the Freeif you German just knocked against a wooden cell wall. But the solitary confinement block wasn’t go- Youthknocked (Freie against Deutsche a wooden Jugend cell) organisation,wall. But the solitary and from confinement its very beginningblock wasn’t itgo -was ing to fall, and the seven cell blocks went on doing their job. Of course, any word associateding to fall, with and major the seven communist cell blocks activists, went on doinge.g. Erich their job.Honecker, Of course, from any 1971word the generalspoken secretary loudly of wouldthe Socialist be heard Unity in the Party neighbouring of Germany cell. But (SED) those who who later were became impris- spoken loudly would be heard in the neighbouring1 cell. But those who were impris- oned there were afraid of being punished.1 the onedchairman there wereof the afraid FDJ. The of being politicalpunished. and propaganda profile of the publishing house and its social-educational functions were clear. Paradoxically, though, such The citizens of the USSR always feared punishment – sometimes more, sometimes a strongThe positioncitizens of in the the USSR DDR’s always publishing feared punishmentenvironment – sometimesdid not actually more, guaranteesometimes less. They did not complain. They made sure not to displease the authorities. They anless. easy They path did to not publication complain. for They the respectable made sure notand to widely displease read the work authorities. W pustyni They kept silent. During the years of the Great Purge, people did not talk to each other in i kept w puszczysilent. During by Henryk the years Sienkiewicz. of the Great On Purge, the contrary, people did the not experiences talk to each of other Neues in raised voices; they spoke quietly about insignificant matters and without giving any Lebenraised voices;editors theywho spokeprepared quietly the aboutmost widelyinsignificant read young matters adult and novel without by onegiving of theany bestnames. known In (in public the 19thtransport, century!) on the Polish underground, writers could and inoffer Moscow a classic’s streets example you could of names. In public transport, on the underground, and 2in Moscow’s streets you could not hear any conversations. Silence was pervasive.2 Some of the still free poets, e.g. censorshipnot hear any in conversations. a socialist state. Silence was pervasive. Some of the still free poets, e.g. When,Anna Akhmatova, by the end of burnt 1955, thetheir publishing poems so house’sthat they employees cannot fall were into developing the hands the of in- Anna Akhmatova, burnt their poems so that they cannot fall into the hands of in- 3 vestigators, while imprisoned writers, e.g. Shalamov, were sentenced to be forgotten.3 publishingvestigators, planwhile for imprisoned the following writers, calendar e.g. Shalamov, year and wereincluded sentenced Sienkiewicz’s to be forgotten. novel in it, they probably did not suspect that their efforts to familiarise young East German * Professor of the University of Lodz, Ph.D. hab.; University of Lodz, Faculty of Philosophy and readers* Professor with of the the courageous University of character Lodz, Ph.D. of hab.; Staś University Tarkowski of Lodz,and hisFaculty lovable of Philosophy companion and History, Institute of Ethnology and Cultural Anthropology; ul. Lindleya 3/5, 90-131 Łódź; -mar NellyHistory, Rawlison Institute would of Ethnology face such and obstacles Cultural Anthropology;put in place ul.by Lindleya officers 3/5, 90-131who yielded Łódź; marthe- [email protected] [email protected] power1 Wof. Szałamow,ideological “Protezy”, and political [in:] Opowiadania censorship. kołymskie The, vol. story II, trans. of W pustyniJ. Baczyński, Wydawnictwoi w puszczy AT- 1 W. Szałamow, “Protezy”, [in:] Opowiadania kołymskie, vol. II, trans. J. Baczyński, Wydawnictwo AT- and theEXT, East Gdańsk German 1991, pp. censors 249–251. could[English be version: considered V. Shalamov, as Komylaa model Tales example, NYRB Classics, of that. 2018.] EXT, Gdańsk 1991, pp. 249–251. [English version: V. Shalamov, Komyla Tales, NYRB Classics, 2018.] 2 Vide: O. Figes, Szepty. Życie w stalinowskiej Rosji, trans. Wł. Jeżewski, Wydawnictwo Magnum, 2 Vide: O. Figes, Szepty. Życie w stalinowskiej Rosji, trans. Wł. Jeżewski, Wydawnictwo Magnum, * Ph.D.Warszawa hab., Adam 2008, Mickiewicz pp. 215–266. University in Poznań, Faculty of Modern Languages and Warszawa 2008, pp. 215–266. 3Literatures, Vide: D. Institute Szkoła, “Zakładniczkaof German Studies, historii”, Department [in:] Zmiany, of metamorfozy,Polish-German rewolucje Literary, Relations;M. Czapiga, 3 Vide: D. Szkoła, “Zakładniczka historii”, [in:] Zmiany, metamorfozy, rewolucje, M. Czapiga, e-mail:K. Konarska [email protected] (eds.), Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Wrocławskiego, Wrocław 2018, pp. 25–35. K. Konarska (eds.), Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Wrocławskiego, Wrocław 2018, pp. 25–35. 422 Marek Rajch However, its model nature was not determined by the ever-extending publishing procedure or the attempts by the publishing house to acquire publication permits, or even the excessive complexities of those procedures. The publication procedure, in that case, was short. It took under 6 weeks, from 20 December 1955 (when the publishing house submitted to the censorship office an application for a print permit) to 1 February 1956 (the final decision of the office).1 The model nature of the story consisted in the fact that the publishing house’s internal reviewer, who as per the assumptions of the DDR’s censorship system was the initial censor, presented a completely different opinion from that offered by the reviewer of the ministry of culture, i.e. a censorship officer. Since the decision of the internal reviewer was decisive, Sienkiewicz’s novel was removed from the production plan of the publishing house for 1956. The editorial board of the publishing house, which submitted titles for the procedure of issuing a print permit, had to fill out a specific form, which changed over the years. The form valid in the mid-1950s included a box for a short description of the content of the book being submitted (Kurze Inhalts-Charakteristik). In the case of W pustyni i w puszczy, the editorial board of the Neues Leben publishing house included the following remarks in the box: During the Mahdist War in Sudan, Staś and Nell were kidnapped and held hostage. After many unsuccessful attempts, the boy and the persons under his care manage to escape and return to their parents. Apart from Staś’s moving love for his little companion and the friendship between man and animal, the book includes rich de- scriptions of the African plant and animal worlds.2 Apparently, the publishing house expected a good level of sales of the book as they applied for 20,000 copies. The publishing house’s reviewer noticed in Sienkiewicz’s work certain “ideological flaws”, yet he failed to discuss these in his evaluation of the novel. One could even conclude that he intentionally, out of caution, included that remark in the final paragraph of his evaluation. Such a structure of the review fulfilled, clearly, two functions. On the one hand, it was supposed to protect the reviewer against any possible accusations of overlooking the novel’s ideological problems. On the other, though, the fact that he included the line “which force one to turn a blind eye to the ideological flaws”3 in a paragraph in which he mentioned only the positive aspects of the novel cannot be interpreted other than as intended 1 Vide: BArch, DR 1/5077, Henryk Sienkiewicz, Durch Wildnis und Wüste, Verlag Neues Leben, Berlin 1956, Druckgenehmigungsbogen, k. 127–128. 2 Ibidem, k. 128 [unless indicated otherwise, English versions of quotations were translated from Polish]. 3 Ibidem, Verlagsgutachten dated 17.12.1955, k. 134. Henryk Sienkiewicz’s output and literary censorship in the DDR 423 to draw the censors attention to the novel’s positive aspects. It is hard to resist the feeling that the closing paragraph of the internal review entitled “Evaluation” stemmed from the publishing house’s tactic or, at least, attempt at avoiding any possible difficulties in publishing the planned titles: The presentation of the boy Staś is wonderful and humanly touching. He is a prota- gonist who will become a role model for every young person. His courage, persisten- ce and readiness to make sacrifices are admirable. It is moving how delicately and movingly the author presented with much skill the boy’s love and his sense of duty all the way until giving himself up.
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