Wszystkie moje mamy [All of My Mums]

Author: Renata Piątkowska
Illustrator: Maciej Szymanowicz
Year: 2013
Publisher: Literatura
Place of publication: Łódź
Pages: 47
ISBN: 9788376722566
Notes: “Wojny dorosłych – historie dzieci” series
Translations:
  • All of My Mums, trans. K. Kożurno, ill. M. Szymanowicz, Łódź: Literatura 2016, pp. 51, ISBN: 9788376724553;
  • Tutte le mie mamme, trans. B. Majchrzak, ill. M. Szymanowicz, 2019, pp. 48, Firenze: La Giuntina, ISBN: 9788880577812.
Cover courtesy of the publisher. ©Wydawnictwo Literatura

The narrator is Szymon Bauman, an older man reminiscing on the times of war when he witnessed the Holocaust as little Szymek. When the war starts, he, his sister and his mother are forced to wear armbands with the star of David in public places, and later on – relocate into the Ghetto. Soon, Chana, the boy’s younger sister, is taken to Umschlagplatz and transported to Treblinka, and his mother falls ill. Then, Sister Jolanta (Irena Sendler is her real name) intervenes, helping the family and preparing Szymek to escape back to the so-called “Aryan” side, where he may have a chance to survive the war and the Shoah. The “Mums” in the title are guardians who care for the boy on the other side of the wall. Szymek’s last stop out of the Ghetto is a house in Otwock, where he meets other children rescued like him and lives to see the end of the war.

This book portrays the work of Irena Sendler, one of the Righteous Among the Nations who arranged for Jewish children to be smuggled out of the Ghetto onto the “Aryan” side during the war. Although the novel’s characters, apart from Sendler, are fictional, the procedure of rescuing a Jewish child from the Ghetto is described in a very realistic manner, including the training to play the role of a non-Jewish Pole.

 

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