Translating M. M. Borwicz

DIFFERENT CONTEXTS of M. M. Borwicz’s Ecrits des condamnés à mort

10.30–11.15
Judith Lyon-Caen: Ecrits des condamnés à mort: a portemanteau book?
In his 1953 preface to Ecrits, René Cassin praised Borwicz for having »blared out the voices and the messages of the most inexplicable tragedy’s martyrs« in the Sorbonne fortress. I will focus on the reception of the book in 1953 and show how Borwicz melted his post-war Polish works into a French »doctorat ès lettres« .

11.30–12.15
Piotr Laskowski: Particular voices and the totality of narration: Michel Borwicz’s sociology
To undertake his sociological project, Borwicz seems to have dismissed his early idea of composing a constellation of particular testimonies as motivated only by a »souci d’hommage pieux« (»pious homage«). Yet, the tension between the focus on »aspects particuliers« (»distinctive aspects«) of every single testimony and an attempt to apprehend these texts as »phenomènes totaux« (»total phenomena«) permeates his opus magnum. I will reflect on this tension and the way Borwicz strives to preserve and render the singularity of the written experience within his socio-historical narration.

12.30–13.30
Discussion


TRANSLATION WORKSHOP

14.45–17.45
Agnieszka Grudzińska, Judith Lyon-Caen: How to edit Borwicz?
Discussion based on French language fragments of M. M. Borwicz’s Ecrits des condamnés à mort and original documents – first published in Polish Borwicz’s text (Literatura w obozie, Introduction to Pieśń ujdzie cało…) that were – then – incorporated into Ecrits… and original testimonies collected in Polish/ Yiddish that Borwicz quotes in Ecrits