When despair and hopelessness already touched the bottom... Evaluation of the world and people in the reality of war based on Sara Nomberg-Przytyk’s reminiscences Samson’s Collumns

Urszula Brzozowska

Uniwersytet w Białymstoku

Abstract

The article depicts the issue of evaluating the world and people in the reality of war. It defines the value as a philosophical concept and presents its basic typologies. The research material derives from reminiscences of Sara Nomberg-Przytyk, a Polish Jew who lived in the Bialystok ghetto during the war. She describes the war reality, presents her thoughts and reflections connected with the functioning of people who experienced humiliation and were forced to live in inhumane conditions. The analyzed material distinguishes several essential groups of the objects being thus evaluated. They comprise: people (Germans – oppressors, and Jews – victims), living standards and conditions, the city space and a new life situation. They are, in general, evaluated as negative. Linguistic devices applied by S. Nomberg-Przytyk emphasize Germans’ cruelty and refer to Jews in an ambivalent way; those Jews who were honest and helpful deserve respect whereas spying, cunning and egocentric activities are connected with depreciation. Whenever living standards are discussed, attention is paid, most of all, to lack of food, clean water and housing space. Although the author negatively evaluates the ghetto’s overpopulation, she occasionally calls it a lifeless deserted city thus emphasizing the fact of a permanent relation with death. A new wartime life situation of Bialystok Jews is determined with the help of emotional lexemes which are always carrying a negative evaluation. The final part of the article is devoted to the system of values professed by S. Nomberg-Przytyk and the companions of her tragic stay in the ghetto.