Author: Ewa Nowak
Illustrator: Anna Kurdziel
Year: 2018
Publisher: Egmont
Place of publication: Warszawa
Pages: 62
ISBN: 9788328115736
Notes: “Czytam sobie” series
This short biography of Irena Sendler was designed not only to present the protagonist’s social work, but also the realities of World War Two. The book’s first pages introduce the historical and social context of the time (in such chapters as “World War Two”, “Germany”, “The Occupied Warsaw”, “The Wall and the Ghetto”, “Poles and Jews”), and the narrative on Sendler’s life follows. Key activities of “siostra Jolanta” (Sendler’s pseudonym) are described, such as the smuggling of clothing, food and medicine into the Ghetto, and rescuing children out of it, as well as placing them in hideouts on the “Aryan” side of Warsaw. The story concludes at the end of the war. Sendler is forgotten, and made a household name only after 1965, when she receives the title of a Righteous Among the Nations from the state of Israel.
Who Saved One Life… was assigned the highest level of difficulty in the “Czytam sobie” (“Reading for Myself”) series promoting literacy in children aged 5-7. The formula of the series requires this biography to be written in simple language, which facilitates the transfer of basic historical knowledge on the Holocaust, and the introduction to the world of Jewish culture.
Bibliography:
- Rybak, K., Dzieciństwo w labiryncie getta. Recepcja mitu labiryntu w polskiej literaturze dziecięcej o Zagładzie, Warszawa 2019 (p. 15, 106–107);
- Rybak, K., Stosunki polsko-żydowskie i Zagłada w polskiej literaturze dziecięcej XXI wieku, [in:] Stosunki polsko-żydowskie, vol. 2, Kultura. Literatura, sztuka i nauka w XX wieku, ed. Z. Trębacz, Warszawa 2020, pp. 171–187 (p. 177, fn. 21; 179);
- Rybak, K., Zagłada i ideologia w polskiej literaturze dziecięcej XXI wieku, „Narracje o Zagładzie”, no. 1(7), 2021, pp. 155–173 (p. 159, fn. 18);
- Rybak, K., „Zupełnie inne miasto”. Obrazy warszawskiego getta w polskiej literaturze dziecięcej XXI wieku, „Dzieciństwo. Literatura i Kultura”, no. 3(1), 2021, pp. 67–84 (p. 76);
- Rybak, K., Obrazowanie Zagłady. Narracje holokaustowe w polskiej literaturze XXI wieku dla dzieci i młodzieży, Warszawa 2023 (s. 55, 239).