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Review
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Secret City: The Hidden Jews of Warsaw, 1940-1945. Gunnar
S. Paulsson. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2003. 328 pages,
$35.00 cloth.
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Popular and scholarly accounts of the Warsaw ghetto's existence
and uprising abound, but Gunnar Paulsson's discussion of "The
Secret City," departs from this path to chart the survival
of Jews on the outside of the walls of the Warsaw ghetto, also known
as the "Aryan" side of the city. In so doing, he not only
corrects existing assumptions about their fate, but argues for a
reconsideration of the category "escape" in response to
persecution. Warsaw was a center of Judaic culture before the war,
and its ghetto became a focal point of the persecution of the Jews,
culminating in a Jewish uprising in response to its liquidation
in April 1943. Most accounts, Paulsson notes, end here, even though
Jews continued to survive within the city, thanks to their escape
from the ghetto before its destruction or because they continued
to live in the gentile sections of the city. Popular understandings
of the Shoah would call these survivors resisters, but Paulsson
rejects both this label and that of passivity, a label which Raul
Hilberg and other pioneers of Holocaust Studies ascribed to those
who fled or hid. Rather, he shows that the 28,000 or so Jews who
lived, as it were, on the "other side," formed a kind
of "Secret City" with challenges and dangers that differed
from the ones encountered within the ghetto. Because the survival
of these Jews has been overlooked, Paulsson argues for a reconsideration
of existing studies of the Holocaust. In fact, he adds that a closer
examination of the victims' psychology and circumstances would help
differentiate flight from fight, and show rational choice behind
the decision to flee (pp. 12-13).
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Paulsson does not stop at criticism
of previous work. He is equally critical of the reliability of memoirs
on all sides and of official and private documents, and sees a need
to reestimate the numbers of victims and survivors in the light
of such material. His discussion of these issues, both in the introduction
and chapter six (the introduction alone is an excellent summary
of the field's stance regarding the Jews of Warsaw), are extremely
useful for anyone wishing to understand the burden of Holocaust
historians. However, students will find the discussion difficult.
Not that the book is unclear. On the contrary, Paulsson's approach
is a model of clarity for the handling of so intricate a topic.
Paulsson frames his account very carefully: glossaries, tables,
even a pronunciation guide for all Polish words as well as clear
summaries of each chapter's intent and finding all help keep the
reader's attention. For example, in his chapter on "Networks"
Paulsson weaves together personal accounts with archival evidence,
and offers a good thematic approach to differentiate the cultural
milieus and the threats Jews dealt with within and outside the ghetto
walls. The matter of escape itself is discussed in great detail
in the following chapter, which frames the chronology in relation
to four time periods in the Warsaw ghetto's existence. Paulsson
then moves on to consider the Secret City itself, both in terms
of social and cultural life, and of the forces that threatened its
existence. Of particular interest here is his discussion of the
"Blue police" (Polish officers), and the peculiar role
of the szmalcowniks (extortionist) in everyday life. More
disturbing, but extremely important, is his analysis of Polish anti-Semitism
and what role it played in Jewish persecutions. And yet despite
such difficulties, an estimated 11, 500 Jews remained alive to the
end of the war in Warsaw with the help of 70,000 to 90,000 gentiles.
Many of the latter, however, were involved for pecuniary rather
than humanitarian reasons.
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Paulsson's account does not indulge
in sentimentality, and will shake many readers' assumptions about
the categories of rescuers and bystanders as well as victims and
resisters. Indeed, his assertions about escape as a category separate
from both resistance and victimhood may upset some supporters of
earlier academic categories. As a teaching resource for instructors,
this book is of very high value, but the only students able to handle
it would likely be members of senior undergraduate seminars, or
of advanced survey courses. Indeed, by seeking to be inclusive in
his coverage, and discussing realms often left untouched in Holocaust
research, Paulsson does a great service to the field, but his thoroughness
may also confuse students unfamiliar with Holocaust studies beyond
the basic chronology. Yet when properly introduced in a course and
complemented by, say, a selection of diaries, Secret City
promises to help readers rethink their understanding of ghetto life
and Jewish-gentile relationships under conditions of war and genocide.
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Albright College
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Guillaume de Syon
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