BOOKS IN BRIEF

 

Reviews by David Trawinski

 

A First-hand glimpse into Poland

s Road to Freedom


 

Eye on Solidarity

by Sonya Zalubowski

Copyright 2022

Published by the Associate Press

 

There occurs throughout history several periods of intense cultural labors, which precede and ultimately produce — the most vital re-births of nations and their peoples. Certainly, one of those periods was in the early 1980s in Poland, as the rise of the Solidarity Movement manifested to the countrys repressive communist government the true dissatisfaction of the masses under its rule. Thanks to Sonya Zalubowskis Eye on Solidarity, we are afforded a first-hand glimpse into the tensions suffered, the hardships endured, and the sacrifices demanded of those Poles who yearned only to throw off the yoke of a failed governments unjust burden. These moments can often go terribly awry, as with the French Revolution, but in other times produce amazing results as in the fall of communism in Eastern Europe.

 

The period so rivetingly documented by the author is that between the Gdańsk Solidarity strike in the summer of 1980 and the imposition of Martial Law by Prime Minister Wojciech Jaruzelski in December 1981. The former event famously found electrician, Lech Wałęsa, scaling the shipyard walls because its gates had been chained shut, while the latter found Solidarity spokesman Wałęsa and others locked away in prison for nothing more than daring to make demands on behalf of Polands suffering population. In between, we have a young woman, our author, arriving at that fray as an international language student. In fact, it was a mere cover, as her innermost desire was to report on the brewing cultural resistance of the Poles. In her own ambitious and perhaps naïve way, she saw the opportunity as her Brenda Starr moment, when she would become a truly intrepid international reporter.

 

The joy of this accounting is that it is not a dry exposé of what Poles in Warsaw and throughout the country were experiencing. Instead, it is an exciting reliving of the authors own experiences told in such an intriguing fashion that the reader will find themselves wondering whether it is fact or narrative fiction. It is undoubtedly rooted in the cold, hard truth of the time, but the authors retelling of events is so skillful she makes one experience her own feelings of near-unending angst, introspective second-guessing and even fear for her own personal safety from the authorities. The reader will have a difficult time putting this work down.

 

The metering of her cache of three thousand U.S. dollars becomes the suspenseful timeline of the tale. Unable to receive any more cash from the outside world, she makes the most of her reserves by exploring the world of the black market, where the exchange rate for złotys far exceeds that of the government-dictated exchange rate. Even though it was commonplace in Warsaw at the time everyone desperately wanted the coveted U.S. dollar to access the black market, this still opened Zalubowski up to being arrested by government undercover agents. As the story is told, and her stash of dollars slowly dwindles, one wonders if the author will find herself totally depleted and stuck in the country permanently.

 

During her time in Poland, Zalubowski was able to establish herself with articles which would run throughout the U.S. and beyond, eventually featuring her own by-line. We relive with her the difficulty in establishing a network of sources to get these pieces out of Poland, free and clear of the government censors. We join in her excitement as she travels outside Warsaw, to Gdańsk on the Baltic, to Zakopane in the Tatras and other locations in the country. We share her observations as she sits in press conferences with Lech Wałęsa himself. We feel within her the tedium of standing in line for hours with ration coupons wondering if the store will have anything left to sell by the time she makes it to the counter. We feel her wondering just how much her Polish Heritage connects her to these souls.

 

What I found most impressive was Zalubowskis ability to convey her conflicting emotions. She describes the pangs of guilt she felt in taking excessively high black market exchange rates from a hard-working cab driver who needed dollars to update his cab. We feel the remorse she felt in going to government stocked stores that would take dollars only and treat herself to otherwise unavailable foods while she could see the lines at stores just across the street. The author feels she betrays her landlady when, after her fortunes improve, she moves out to take up residence in a Western style hotel. Zalubowski shows us all her inner qualms, not just her more noble aspirations. She does so with an honesty that few authors achieve.

 

If this work has an Achilles Heel, it is in the last two chapters which attempt to update the story of her reporting in Warsaw from 1980 with more recent Polish Government activities. After noting the recent establishment of Eastern European authoritative-style governments, Zalubowski critiques the conservative nature of the Law and Justice Party (PiS) party. I found this to be unnecessary and distracting from the rest of the book. Democracy is alive and well in Poland, and yet when that process delivers a shift away from current questionable Western values, some feel it necessary to insinuate democracy is failing there. Contrasting why Poland would allow masses of Ukrainians to migrate into their country after the Russian Invasion when the same Poles so defiantly resisted hordes of migrants of Iraq, Syria and Afghanistan from entering along the Belarusian border, in my opinion, detracts from this overall work. Yet, nonetheless, I wholeheartedly recommend this title.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Polish American Journal

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