One third of the Ukrainian population is displaced – over eight million abroad and at least five and a half million internally, constituting the biggest forced displacement in Europe since the Second World War. Curiously, around one third of those who had fled after February 24th 2022 have already returned, with the International Organisation for Migration putting the number as high as six million. Yet, they returned, against all odds.

The full-scale war in Ukraine and the refugee influx that followed sent shockwaves throughout Europe. However, a large number of refugees coming back also caught many by surprise. They returned despite the war still raging throughout the country, and despite receiving an unprecedentedly warm welcome. Myself also being puzzled, I looked for answers and found a couple of think tank papers. The analysts meticulously present statistics and draw maps and graphs. There are survey data responses and discussions on the size of welfare payments, the distribution of housing and other resources for the refugees. Still, I am not convinced. When examining the statistics of millions, a person inevitably gets lost. Hence, I set out to look at the individual behind the digits.  

An interview with Ishbel Szatrawska, a Polish writer and playwright. Interviewer: Łukasz Dąbrowiecki

ŁUKASZ DĄBROWIECKI: Your drama titled “The Life and Death of Mr. Hersh Libkin of Sacramento, CA” is unique, firstly, because dramas are rarely printed in book form before they are staged.

ISHBEL SZATRAWSKA: In Poland, yes.

But also because many readers perceive it in a cinematic way. I myself got the impression that it has the dynamics of an American movie from the 1990s. Am I correct in seeing it as a product of your fascination with cinema?

There is no denying that all the dramas that I have written have, at least in part, these cinema-style dynamics. I attended film studies at the Jagiellonian University for a while and film school for two years. Film was my first love, while theatre came second, and sort of by chance. After high school, I was wondering whether to apply to the famous Polish film school in Łódź. Finally, I decided to do theatre studies in Kraków at the Jagiellonian University, which was also interesting and inspiring.

The geopolitical conceptions of Vladimir Putin are strikingly reminiscent of the visions of Friedrich Ratzel, Karl Haushofer and especially Joseph Stalin. Putin basically thinks the same things as these figures but needs more justification. This is where a “memory masquerade” comes in, involving Nazism, racism, antisemitism and a reminder of the origins of Russia's greatness. The portfolio of historical and memorial references does not stop at European history for Russia.

On June 28th 2005 the Warsaw-based Batory Foundation organised a conference titled “Memory and Foreign Policy”. During this event, Bronisław Geremek, a historian and Poland’s former minister of foreign affairs, asked a question as to whether collective memory is part of foreign policy. His answer was the following: "I think it is a part of international relations, for example when governments protest when national dignity is attacked. Of course, it is a part of international negotiations, for example to open access to archives … but all this is only marginal in foreign policy.” We shall see whether this marginality of memory is true today.

The role of women in conflict is often viewed as being on the home front, far away from the front lines of battle. Despite this, the story of Poland’s struggle for independence in the First World War would not be complete without acknowledging the selfless activities undertaken by female volunteers.

One hundred and ten years ago war again came to the vicinity of the city of Kraków. What is now perceived in the West as an unparalleled tragedy, the near collapse of a civilisation and a catastrophe of lost youth was perceived then as a different story, on the verge of three empires: German, Austro-Hungarian and Russian. The outbreak of war marked the end of an unbelievable stability which had lasted more or less since the compromising political treaty conference in Vienna in 1815, with only a short interval for the so-called “Hundred Days” campaign with the Battle of Waterloo in June of the same year – a battle which marked the end of the epic connected to the revolutionary export of Napoleonic civilisation.