I’d Like to Say Sorry, but There’s No One to Say Sorry To: Stories
by Mikołaj Grynberg
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Description
"Mikolaj Grynberg is a psychologist and photographer who has spent years collecting and publishing oral histories of Polish Jews. In his first work of fiction--a book that has been widely praised by critics and was shortlisted for Poland's top literary prize--Grynberg recrafts those histories into little jewels, fictionalized short stories with the ring of truth. Both biting and knowing, I'd Like to Say Sorry, but There's No One to Say Sorry To takes the form of first-person vignettes, show more through which Grynberg explores the daily lives and tensions within Poland between Jews and gentiles haunted by the Holocaust and its continuing presence. In "Unnecessary Trouble," a grandmother discloses on her deathbed that she is Jewish; she does not want to die without her family knowing. What is passed on to the family is fear and the struggle of what to do with this information. In "Cacophony," Jewish identity is explored through names, as Miron and his son Jurek demonstrate how heritage is both accepted and denied. In "My Five Jews," a non-Jewish narrator remembers five interactions with her Jewish countrymen, and her own anti-Semitism, ruefully noting that perhaps she was wrong and should apologize, but no one is left to say "I'm sorry" to. Each of the thirty-one stories is a dazzling and haunting mini-monologue that highlights a different facet of modern Poland's complex and difficult relationship with its Jewish past."--Provided by publisher. show lessTags
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Member Reviews
I am sorry to be the first person commenting on these stories. I am not a person who usually values mordant humor. I did not live through the experiences the author and interviewees had, so I also do not know how helpful laughter at this time can be. The reason I am rating it a 3 is because I either learned or re-learned new experiences of many Poles. I am horrified by many of these experiences and saddened that history itself is so repetitous.
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Judaism & Israel
104 works; 2 members
Author Information
Some Editions
Awards and Honors
Common Knowledge
- Original title
- Rejwach
- Original publication date
- 2017
- Original language
- Polish
Classifications
- Genres
- Fiction and Literature, General Fiction
- DDC/MDS
- 891.8 — Literature & rhetoric Literatures of other languages East Indo-European and Celtic literatures West and South Slavic languages (Bulgarian, Slovene, Polish, Czech, Slovak, Serbo-Croatian, and Macedonian)
- LCC
- PG7207 .R96 .R45 — Language and Literature Slavic languages and literatures. Baltic languages. Albanian language Slavic. Baltic. Albanian Slavic Polish
- BISAC
Statistics
- Members
- 29
- Popularity
- 954,255
- Reviews
- 1
- Rating
- (3.67)
- Languages
- English, French
- Media
- Paper, Ebook
- ISBNs
- 4
- ASINs
- 1
