Taduesz Borowski's short story, "Ladies and Gentlemen, to the Gas Chamber" depicts daily life in Auschwitz as described by the story's unnamed protagonist, a non-Jewish Polish prisoner who works in the concentration camp gas chambers. The main character does anything within his power to appeal to the prison guards and work his way up in the camp's hierarchy to improve his material situation and thus guarantee his own survival.
As we saw in class, in Claude Lanzmann's 1985 Holocaust documentary "Shoah," Lanzmann interviews gentile Polish villagers living in close proximity to the Chelmno death camp. It is striking to see how much hatred and stereotyping by the villagers seems to stem from economic disparity. This very famous scene is touched upon in a 2009 article by "The Nation:"
"Shoah's largely unsympathetic portrait of the Poles is the more disturbing for their having escaped historical condemnation thus far, and speaks volumes about the deep roots of anti-Semitism in Poland, both before and after 1945. Yet, the scandalous attacks on Lanzmann in the official Polish press, and the ensuing furor, have almost obscured the significance of Polish anti-Semitism within Shoah itself.
The anti-Semitism of the Poles is primordial, raw and unprocessed, while the Germans filter their reactions through the bureaucratic screen of modern language and precensored speech. The Poles are traditional anti-Semites, unable to conceal their resentments and prejudices, while the Germans are calculating and unrepentant killers hiding behind rational and bureaucratic masks. Apart from demonstrating the persistence of anti-Semitism in contemporary Poland, and apart from documenting the cordon sanitaire it provided for the killing, Shoah draws a sharp contrast between Poles and Germans and accentuates the primeval character of Christian anti-Semitism by contrast with the technological modernity of the Nazi murder machine."
If you are interested you can read more here:
http://www.thenation.com/doc/19860315/rabinbach
My question for you is:
Please share your reactions to "Ladies and Gentelmen, to the Gas Chamber," and Shoah. How do you understand Borowski's narrator? Can you excuse his emotional distancing for the sake of self preservation? And similarly, do you find the nonchalance of the Polish villagers toward the fate of their Jewish contrymen excusable, or maybe understandable? Is Borowski's character and are the Polish villagers complicit in what took place by not standing up?
Please freely share your opinions and reactions.
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Borowski’s narrator is one who endures great hardship and ranges in his emotions concerning those going to their inevitable death. At the beginning, he seems to hate the Jews since he must incessantly work removing their dead, then loading their belongings. This hatred should really be turned on the Nazis since they are the ones forcing him to do such acts simply to survive. As the day goes on, the toil of constantly sending weak women and children to their gruesome death changes him. He can not help but empathize with these people. Instead of seeing the beauty they still have, he only envisions what the future holds, a disheartening, inhumane fate. He no longer cares to get new shoes or a shirt; the reason he volunteered to go from the camp. The day drained him emotionally, and drains the reader with its vivid descriptions of families torn apart and packed to their deaths like animals going to slaughter. This is why I can somewhat empathize with those interviewed in the documentary “Shoah.” Those who opposed the Nazis would likely been sent to the camp enduring the same fate as the protagonist. This is why they failed to fight for the Jews. Though there is no justifiable reason for their clear anti-Semitism, I do not believe any would wish such a death upon their previous neighbors.
ReplyDeleteBorowski’s narrator in “Ladies and Gentlemen, to the gas chamber” is initially somewhat prejudiced toward the Jewish population in the camp, as he feels they are responsible for his workload. Eventually however, he begins questioning whether or not he is a good person for helping send innocent Jews to their untimely deaths, and he gradually becomes more and more troubled by the thought. The initial narrator is similar to the majority of Polish villagers shown in the documentary “Shoah”, as they are ignorant at an almost basic and primordial level. Their attitudes were developed by the harsh and unforgiving village nature, where it seemed there was a natural form of segregation. The Jews seemed to live in communities, on a certain block or street, and the Polish people that actually interacted with them were shown (when the documentary was created) to be troubled by the Jew’s long absence. In a contrast to this, those without any interaction with the Jews seemed to hold serious prejudices and hatred for the Jewish colonies. The character in Borowski’s story is similar to the ignorant Polish villagers with his built-in stereotypes, however after he lives amongst them and sees the pain they begin to endure, he ends up becoming empathetic to them. It seems the overall message to both stories is that people generally fear and distrust what they do not know.
ReplyDeleteBorowski's narrator in "Ladies and Gentlemen, to the gas chamber" is insulting to Jewish people at first because he explains how he has all this work all because of the Jews. He started the story out in this mindset and it doesn't change until he starts to ask himself in the story whether or not what he is doing is the right thing or not? He started to feel some sort of remorse for the Jews because evidently he is sending them to their deaths and all these people haven't done anything to him. As you read more and more you see the narrator ask himself this more and more, and he starts to show an attitude like that of the Polish villagers in the documentary "Shoah". In "Shoah" the villagers seem to miss the times they lived amongst the Jews before they were sent to their deaths. The narrator in Borowski's story starts to act some what like these Polish villagers in the "Shoah" documentary. As more and more Jews were killed the narrator asks himself if he's doing the right thing more frequently and he starts to give off an attitude that he almost misses the Jews that are being terminated just like the Polish villagers. However I believe that both the narrator and the Polish villagers didn't stand up for the Jews because they were afraid of what would happen to them.
ReplyDeleteBorowski's narrator is, unfortunately enough, not particularly different from any of us. He appears devoid of morality in the face of his experiences in the camps, but there is little to suggest any modern person from a comfortable background would fare any better when faced with such a bleak and desperate situation. In addition to the extremity of his life, the camps themselves are designed to break apart an individual's humanity, through constant exposure to death and encouragement of moral deprivation, and it takes an incredibly strong will to resist such tactics. The villagers in the Polish towns, and even the Nazis themselves, can't truly be characterized as monsters with an understanding of psychology. The famous Milgram experiment demonstrated that ordinary individuals will subject a stranger to immense torture and even death if there is detachment from the victim and an authoritative figure urging one on. Additionally, the villagers in particular demonstrate common psychological defense mechanisms, including denial and justification, as ways of escaping the recognition that they have committed great wrongs against humanity.
ReplyDeleteIn the work, “Ladies and Gentleman, to the Gas Chamber”, I feel that the narrator did a perfect job in revealing this story since it is a very “touchy” situation. I do not blame the way he approached the situation, it seems that at the time this was all he knew of, so it was almost inevitable to have some bias attitude towards those that were in the concentration camp. Though he was opinionated on the topic, I feel that his attitudes also help to bring out both sides of the stories as he told what the victims were going through also. I feel the same way about the villagers in the film “Shoah”, while most of them seemed to not be too heart -broken about the attacks that happened in their villages, which seems to be pretty obscure to me. Then again, while it may not be right, it is probably the only way they were taught about the situation. I do feel that if characters like the narrator and the village people, did stand up to these heinous acts more could have been done to help this innocent people.
ReplyDeleteBorowski’s narrator is a tortured man. Within himself he struggles to align his emotions with the atrocities he witnesses in his surroundings, and is forced to commit himself. On page 2781, the narrator claims to feel a pathological rage towards the victims of the gas chamber that he must be at the camp on their account. He states that he is not the least bit sorry for them, and would kill them himself with his own fists. And yet the fact that he feels such strong emotions of disgust and outrage, a wild terror that overwhelms him with nausea, indicates that he feels a sense of humanity for the people headed for the gas chamber. Any man or woman forced to commit such obscenities must emotionally distance him or herself through whatever means necessary in order to survive. The psychological trauma inflicted by carrying out orders in war that end the lives of hundreds or even thousands of people can be crippling. The narrator is forced to reconcile his emotions and create defenses for the sake of self-preservation.
ReplyDeleteThe case of the Polish villagers interviewed in the documentary Shoah is very similar. The villagers may have felt at the time that they had little or no control over the situation, and that any attempt on their part to stand up against what was taking place would endanger themselves and their families. It is understandable that the villagers would cling to their already hardened opinions of Jewish people as a means of survival. To claim that Borowski’s character or the Polish villagers are complicit in what took place would be rather harsh in my opinion. Gathering a force great enough to stand up against the SS-men would take an army, as the war itself proved. To rebuke the villagers or Borowski’s character for not standing up for a higher set of values would show a great amount of ignorance in terms of understanding the power hierarchy in place at that time. For one or only a few men to stand up against the Nazis would most assuredly be a death sentence for them and their families.
It seems to me as though it would have taken a lot more than a few villagers standing up to the Nazi’s to make a difference. While I cannot condone anti-Semitic views, it seems as though those who watched as Jews were taken from their homes and killed were between a rock and a hard place. In the video, no one seemed to think that the genocide of the Jewish people was necessarily a good thing, but had they made an effort to speak out against this injustice or do anything to try to stop it, they would have ended up in the same situation. Personally, if I had a family relying on me, I would not want to give my life by showing my disapproval towards the merciless, powerful Nazi regime, knowing that I had no chance of saving even one life, potentially even furthering the Nazi anger and putting more lives in danger. It was an impossible choice for them.
ReplyDeleteThere doesn't seem to be an easy way to determine whether or not Borowski's narrator is at fault or not since nothing about war is completely black and white. It would be easy to condemn him for his lack of sympathy towards the executed and imprisoned Jews, but he is also a prisoner like them. He blames his situation on the Jews being Jews; if they had never held their beliefs then he wouldn't be there. I believe that if he hadn't distanced himself so much from them he would have suffered much more seeing them line up to die day after day. His act of distancing himself was an effort to protect his heart and with it what was left of his sanity. Similarly, it's difficult to place blame on those people who knew what was happening to the Jews and did nothing about it. It's easy to say that if you were in their place you would have done something, but it would have been them against the entire Nazi army and the power they represented at that time. There was probably a great fear of speaking up against what was going on, not only out of concern for themselves, but for their family and friends, anyone who they knew. Also, it seemed like most of the interviewed people in Shoah were convinced that their lives were better off. It may not have been the best reason for their lack of action, but it is understandable at the very least.
ReplyDeleteGrace Mellor
ReplyDeleteThe intentions of Borowski's character were of survival as were the of the Polish Villagers during WW2. However, I believe the difference is that the the villagers many years later still held very anti-Semitic attitudes that were not motivated by self preservation. I think it's difficult to say the the narrator is wrong for being emotionally disengaged from the horrific events happening around him because I have never been in a situation in which I would have to fight for my survival. People do unimaginable things in the face of death that aren't ethical but until one is in a their shoes who is to say they were wrong. The narrator was facing the end of a gun or a gas chamber at any moment, unlike the villagers who could go on with daily living without an SS guard standing over them. Although, they probably felt very threatened by the Nazis and new that speaking out against them could lead to death, their anti-Semitic attitudes were ingrained in their culture and they probably didn't disagree with what the Nazis were doing because they benefited from it.
In a way I can understand the narrator's dehumanizing of and distancing of himself from the Jews. On one hand it can be argued that the narrator was helping the Nazis kill these people and so he is at fault as well. On the other, it is easy to see that if we refused to help, or in fact acted out against, maybe even attacked an officer the likely outcome is that he would be shot, tortured, or even gassed himself. The reality is that any resistance of this type would have been a futile gesture, and a suicidal one at that. Did the narrator technically help the Nazis? Yes. But I can't help but wonder if through my drive to survive in a place like a death camp I wouldn't distance myself as much as possible to keep some modicum of sanity as well, especially when faced with powerlessness to change my situation any other way, for the better.
ReplyDeleteIn the case of the Poles, it is easy to see that they have deep rooted mistrust or emnity of the jews. No group of people deserves this treatment. I feel like others have said though that their lack of action in stopping the Nazi killing of the Jews in their community is somewhat understandable. They probably did this for the same reason that the narrator distanced himself from them. Resistance or action meant harm to self, family, etc. This combined with the fact that resisting would not have had much net positive effect, and it is easy to see how in the minds of many people, distance meant safety. I would like to think that given this situation I would stand up for another grp even against overwhelming odds. But I can't help but feel that if I had children and family who could suffer because of my actions if it might temper my resolve a bit as well.
Borowski's narrator in "Ladies and Gentlemen, to the Gas Chamber" shows his hatred for the Jews at the beginning because he is imprisoned by the Nazis to work at the death camp. The narrator is forced to see and fear death every day, and that is where I think his attitude changed. Day in and day out, he watched as women and children are sent to their death. However, he must do his job for his own survival. The thought of being a part of a mass genocide is traumatizing.
ReplyDeleteThe behavior of the villagers in "Shoah" is slightly different. While some of the Polish villagers miss their Jewish neighbors, others express that their lives were better without the Jews controlling the economy. They now seem to be emotionless and unaffected by what had happened years ago. Even though it is a major part of history, their attitudes do not show sympathy towards the Jews that were killed.
“This Way to the Gas, Ladies and Gentlemen“ was interesting in the sense that the protagonist was not Jewish, but rather a Pole accused of crimes. Because of this he presented an alternative viewpoint of his treatment. He felt hateful of the Jewish prisoners. He felt that his incarceration was a result of a Jewish problem that he had been inadvertently drawn into and therefore blamed the Jews. His actions however are not surprising, by criticizing the Jewish prisoners he in a sense is justifying his own misery and feeling of worthlessness. Similary the Polish citizens interviewed for the film Shoah, though not victims of the concentration camps, also professed a distant sort of apathy when faced with recalling their feelings about the holocaust. Many books have been written on the history of antisemitism, and although I can’t say that I’ve read any, it is certainly evident that Jewish people have been classically treated as scapegoats for much of their existence. Perhaps it is the fact that Jews traditionally were forced to move very often therefore creating the feeling that they were encroaching on the society and jobs of the locations they moved to. Furthermore Jews also traditionally held jobs in financial institutions because Christian religion had forbade these sorts of jobs. This helped in the creation of negative stereotypes of Jewish business practices. But most of all antisemitism seems to stem one, from an inherent desire in society to feel weary of something that is different, and two, the fact that people often need to find someone they feel superior to in order to justify their own weaknesses. The Polish stance on Jews is not surprising. The Polish to suffered during the war. It is arguably natural that they find someone to blame. Of course this is not good nor is it moral, but is it unavoidable? The tragedy of Jewish history is that it took an event such as the holocaust to even remotely suggest to the world that Jews were worthy of a homeland. Yet even today this worthiness is questioned as Israel is condemned for acts of defense that no other country would be similarly criticized for.
ReplyDeleteIt's hard to answer these questions with a simple "yes" or "no". In some ways, I think that it was inexcusable for Borowski's character to not stand up for his fellow prisoners. At the same time, I can't possibly fully comprehend the narrator's feelings and struggles during that time...leading me to conclude that his silence might have been justified. Having met several Holocaust survivors, I've seen firsthand how it hardened peoples' hearts. The suffering would have been even more unbearable for some if they had allowed themselves to feel the pain and speak out against the injustice of it all. It seems to me that becoming unaffected was a survival instinct of sorts for Jewish prisoners. In that case, I don't blame Borowski's narrator at all.
ReplyDeleteWhen it comes to the Polish villagers, I don't have much to say. I've been taught about the Holocaust for almost my entire lifetime, so I feel as though I'm entitled to give my opinion in regards to the Jews in this situation. In contrast, I am not at all familiar with the situation with the villagers in Poland. It seems to me that their silence stems from purely selfish emotions and no regard for the lives of the Jews. From what I've learned in class, I find it hard to excuse the harsh emotions of the Polish towards the fate of their Jewish countrymen.