It's been a momentous year. A tragic air crash in Smolensk claimed the lives of over 95 people, among them Lech Kaczynski, the president of Poland, top military leaders and the indomitable heroine of Solidarity, Anna Walentynowicz - all people who served their country with dedication. Poland's tragedy touched the world, and messages of sympathy covered Polish hearts as much as flowers covered the streets of Poland's cities and towns.
That this accident occurred on the anniversary of Katyn and its victims perished in the very place where they were going to honour the victims of that long-ago crime, added to the shock and grief a need to reflect. This reflection shared by many beyond Poland including unexpected and sincere sympathy from Russian leaders and from the Russian people. Many people felt that out of the burnt embers of the doomed plane would arise a new beginning: a tentative, careful, yet genuine, search for reconciliation.
CR shared the grief, but also now shares in the hope for the future. We are privileged to have the thoughts on reconciliation by no less a Katyn authority that Professor Anna Cienciala, and we feature a review of a book by a man who also shares this hope: Allen Paul, whose new edition of Katyn: Stalin's Massacre and the Triumph of Truth is reviewed in this issue.
CR's regular contributor, Justine Jablonska, covered the Katyn conference that took place in Washington on May 5 of this year, and for this issue of CR she reports on her conversation with documentary director Piotr Uzarowicz whose film about his family's connection to Katyn, The Officer's Wife, premiered at the Kosciuszko Foundation in New York.
Among topics Justine and Piotr discussed is the growing interest in - to borrow a phrase -- "things my father never told me." In CR's section, "From Past to Present" our writers reflect on the experiences of their parents and grandparents at Monte Cassino, in post-war England, and in Pennsylvania.
But it's the present we live in and CR's writers are living, and observing life, everywhere. Kandahar, Budapest, and a Tibetan town in northern India -- though Poland and the united States are not ignored.
Art anyone? CR is delighted to introduce a new writer, Joanna Szupinska who, in turn, introduces us to the Fokus Lodz Biennale 2010 and its Solidarity roots. Artist Pawel Skurski drops in, Ian Wojtowicz makes a return visit, and we take a look back on Tamara de Lempicka's great talent, sad life.
An update on new books, new documentaries, a website named for Sklodowska-Curie's Polonium, and much, much more. It's our biggest issue to date, so get into comfortable chair and settle in to some great reading.
We end with a CR update. We've missed Contributing Editor Anna Kisielewska this issue who is very busy with her newborn son, Oskar Zamudio Kisielewski. And we welcome Nina Jankowicz, a summer intern who, we all think, will not leave us in the fall.
Happy summer, happy reading!
CR's team
Photo: "Summer Flavour" by Daniela Hartmann, from creativecommons.org
