PortadaGruposCharlasMásPanorama actual
Buscar en el sitio
Este sitio utiliza cookies para ofrecer nuestros servicios, mejorar el rendimiento, análisis y (si no estás registrado) publicidad. Al usar LibraryThing reconoces que has leído y comprendido nuestros términos de servicio y política de privacidad. El uso del sitio y de los servicios está sujeto a estas políticas y términos.

Resultados de Google Books

Pulse en una miniatura para ir a Google Books.

Cargando...

Cenizas y diamantes (1948)

por Jerzy Andrzejewski

Otros autores: Ver la sección otros autores.

MiembrosReseñasPopularidadValoración promediaMenciones
377667,195 (3.52)85
Originally published in Poland in 1948, and acclaimed as one of the finest postwar Polish novels, Ashes and Diamonds takes place in the spring of 1945, as the nation is in the throes of its transformation to People' Poland. Communists, socialists, and nationalists; thieves and black marketeers; servants and fading aristocrats; veteran terrorists and bands of murderous children bewitched by the lure of crime and adventure--all of these converge on a provincial town's chief hotel, a microcosm of an uprooted world.… (más)
  1. 00
    No habrá más penas ni olvido por Osvaldo Soriano (chrisharpe)
    chrisharpe: Military dictatorship, communists and anti-communists, armed groups of youths, ideology used for personal gain... the universal absurdity is dealt with in different, though equally effective, ways by Soriano and Andrzejewski.
Cargando...

Inscríbete en LibraryThing para averiguar si este libro te gustará.

Actualmente no hay Conversaciones sobre este libro.

» Ver también 85 menciones

Mostrando 1-5 de 6 (siguiente | mostrar todos)
Jerzy Andrzejewski is one of the four writers featured by Czesław Miłosz in his 1953 book [b:The Captive Mind|145660|The Captive Mind|Czesław Miłosz|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1337280779s/145660.jpg|899117]. Miłosz describes Andrzejewki's writing before WWII, describes his experiences during the war, and gives a blow by blow account of the 1948 novels Ashes and Diamonds, which was an apology for the Soviet takeover of Poland.

In the novel, the communists who are taking over Poland, through what they hope will be only indirect Soviet intervention, with the collaboration of the "new" Polish Army and Government brought in from WWII exile in the Soviet Union, are the good guys. The remnants of the Polish Home Army, leading a rearguard combat against the communists, and the Polish aristocracy are the bad guys. In addition to these two groups, there is a third group: the arrivistes, who have no beliefs one way or the other, but who will do anything to ingratiate themselves with the new power structure.

Well worth reading as a period piece and to get the full import of Miłosz's message about how writers became captive of Soviet social realism. In the beginning, decent people made what they thought were necessary compromises. Then came the tipping point. ( )
  JohnJGaynard | Dec 31, 2018 |
This was a very interesting look at Poland in the last days of WWII. Present are people to represent many of the different factions that have emerged from the war. There are those who want an independent Poland, those who are Communist and don't fear the Russian model (and perhaps occupation), those who are young nihilists who only know terror, and those too damaged by the war to care anymore.

The book deals with the nonsensical killing that is still happening. There is an accidental murder of the wrong people, the murder of a young man by his friends when he refuses to give them money towards their terrorist causes, and the assassination of a prominent Communist. All this murder in the last days of a war that already killed so many - it's dark and horrifying. Some of the characters realize it and some just don't know any other way to live anymore. I think the group of young people who grew into young adulthood during the war are the most hopeless case. It's sad to see them not knowing how to act besides as terrorists, but I think Andrzejewski's point is that it's a side effect of growing up during a war full of atrocities. Another important character was the man who was in a concentration camp and survives by becoming an orderly and beating the other prisoners. He justifies his actions by saying that acting one way in war to survive does not mean you'll still be a bad person when circumstances are different. It's a disturbing thing to think about.

The book has a lot of characters and is somewhat chaotic, reflecting the times, but I found it a great read. It opened up a lot of thoughts about what happens in a country that has been ravaged by war in the end days of the war. There wasn't any relief or happiness here as you might expect. It was all confusion and more killing and people so damaged they don't even know how to move on and don't trust that there is anything to move on to. For all that, it isn't a relentlessly depressing book to read. Andrzejewski tells his story in a matter-of-fact way and has some beautifully phrased sentiments - I found it thoughtful and enlightening. ( )
2 vota japaul22 | Feb 21, 2016 |
A better title for this book might be “Ashes and Ashes”, but although it is rather depressing, it is also an impressive, excellent read. It is all the more impressive that the book was published in 1948, and although there is a lot that goes unspoken (the actions of the Polish partisans and the uneasy relations with the Soviet Union are mentioned in sideways fashion), it is not difficult to see the start of the conflicts and changes that would affect Poland for the next several decades. The book takes places over the course of a few days before and after the end of World War II in the Polish town of Ostrowiec. Unlike, say, the U.S., where the end of WWII meant celebrations, a return to normalcy and triumph over Nazis, Poland after the war was devastated. 25% of the population had been killed, they had been overrun by both the Nazis and Soviets, some of the most notorious concentration camps were located on Polish soil, and the Soviet encroachment was already becoming apparent.

The author follows several related and intersecting characters. There’s an assassination plot, a murder, plotting by various radical groups, political machinations and infighting, and a Communist meeting at the local hotel where many of the characters come to talk, drink and party hedonistically. Andrzejewski portrays his characters sympathetically – at least at first. Gradually, some of their backstories become clearer, and many are shown to be morally gray, compromised, scarily sociopathic, naïve or going down a dangerous path. As many are related, the reader knows why certain characters are acting in puzzling ways which baffle their friends and family. For example, the Kossecki family has reunited after the privations of the war, but they are all in their own isolated misery. Mrs. Kossecki had to hold down their home during the war and longs for their contented, successful pre-war life. She doesn’t understand her husband, newly returned from the camps, or her two sons, Alek and Andrew, who are both radicalized in different ways. Michael Chelmicki, a recent arrival, is taking on an assignment for his shadowy group, but over the course of a couple days finds himself at odds with his friends. Szczuka, a loyal Communist in town for the meeting, can’t communicate with his in-laws, members of the local aristocracy who are carrying on as though it were the pre-war days, and realizes there is an unbridgeable gap between him and his old friend, an upright Socialist.

Besides the inevitably depressing subject matter (murders, people dead or returning from concentration camps), the grey, defeated atmosphere of the book is rather depressing. There’s a sense of emptiness and loss – they sacrificed and lost so much for a present that feels hollow and hopeless. The partisans and radical groups now have no clear goal. Regaining things that they lost seems like an insurmountable task to many of the characters. Those who seem the least affected are the wealthy who have a strong streak of denial, and some selfish, ruthless characters who see the loss of many structures as an opportunity for themselves. Even when the end of the war is announced, the population can barely be bothered to note it – it is just another day and they still have to struggle to survive. It doesn’t help knowing what will happen in the future. (Andrzejewski portrays several of the Communists sympathetically – although others are scheming and selfish – but the introduction notes that the pre-war purges would have likely selected for the scheming and selfish.)

The two introductions in my copy, by Northwestern University Press, were very helpful. They also add in a couple excised passages. However, the names remain anglicized – for example, Maciek is changed to Michael, which was a bit annoying. ( )
3 vota DieFledermaus | Aug 23, 2015 |
Ashes and Diamonds made for a great follow-up to Anne Applebaum’s Iron Curtain and if you are interested in Europe at the end of World War 2 I recommend it highly. It probably helps to know a little bit about Poland during WW2 because there are a huge number of characters in the book, all connected to each other. Ashes and Diamonds is set in Ostrowiec, a small (fictional) town in Poland, over 4 days in May 1945, just as the war in Europe is ending. The end of the war means little to many of the locals, who are trying to get their lives together after a brutal 6 years.

The Kossecki family is all back in one place – the father has survived Auschwitz but hides in his study all day, the mother just wants everything to come right, Andrew is still in the Home Army, and teenage Alek and his mates are up to something. There’s a big party happening at the Hotel Monopole to celebrate Communist victory in the war, and Andrew Kossecki and a friend of his, Michael Chelmicki, have a job to do for the Home Army. There are Communist Party hacks trying to climb their way up, people getting hammered on vodka, former aristocrats unaware at how bad their lives are going to get pretty soon, a band, a lovely barmaid, survivors of the Warsaw Uprising – just about everyone you can think of except for Jews, because they have all been killed.

As usual in books about WW2, this is all about what decisions people made and how they rationalized them. It’s a very readable book and only 240 pages long. ( )
2 vota cushlareads | Jan 13, 2013 |
Originally published in 1948, and considered one of the best Polish postwar novels, Ashes and Diamonds takes place in a Polish town in the days just before and after the German surrender in May 1945. The Soviet army has liberated the town from the Nazis, and it is still unclear what exactly will happen. The town is awash in former Polish Home Army soldiers (although unnamed as such since the Soviets had already taken over by the time of publication), local and Soviet communists, bureaucrats looking to advance, a somewhat discomfited aristocracy, returnees from Nazi concentration camps, teenagers who grew up in the chaos of the war and seem to have no values, those who seek to make money no matter who is in power, and of course regular folks. The novel switches back and forth between various people and their stories, and it takes a little while to figure out who is who and how they are connected.

Essentially, Andrzewjewski portrays people who have had to confront issues of ethics and conscience during the war, or are continuing to confront them, and how they individually decide to act. There are plots to kill people, plots to betray people, and yet people are intertwined in ways that can be awkward, at best, in the fluid situation; for example, the head of the local communists, mourning the death of his wife in a concentration camp, has to tell her sister about her death, and the sister is one of the local aristocrats. Everyone comes together at the town's hotel, the Monopole, which is striving to recapture prewar days, and they all certainly drink as if there is no tomrrow.

The title of the novel comes from a poem by Cyprian Norwid, that asks:

"Will only ashes and confusion remain,
Leading into the abyss? -- or will there be
In the depths of the ash, a star-like diamond,
The dawning of eternal victory!

It is hard to see the diamond in these ashes.

The edition I read had two introductions: one, by Heinrich Böll, written for an earlier edition, before the Wall came down, and one written by Barbara Niemczyk in the post-Communist era. Both point out that, for Polish readers would have immediately understood the unexpressed reality that the Soviets who "liberated" Poland were the same Soviets who occupied it in the days of the Hitler-Stalin nonaggression pact. In addition, Niemczyk notes some errors in the translation, including two long sections that were omitted by the original translator. Finally, I found it disconcerting that the Polish names were "translated" into English (sometimes incorrectly as Niemczyk points out); for example, the Polish name Maciek becomes Michael and Jerzy becomes Julius. I would have preferred it if the translator kept the Polish names.
13 vota rebeccanyc | Jul 22, 2012 |
Mostrando 1-5 de 6 (siguiente | mostrar todos)
sin reseñas | añadir una reseña

» Añade otros autores (13 posibles)

Nombre del autorRolTipo de autor¿Obra?Estado
Andrzejewski, JerzyAutorautor principaltodas las edicionesconfirmado
Böll, HeinrichIntroducciónautor secundarioalgunas edicionesconfirmado
Niemczyk, BarbaraPrólogoautor secundarioalgunas edicionesconfirmado
Welch, D.J.Traductorautor secundarioalgunas edicionesconfirmado
Debes iniciar sesión para editar los datos de Conocimiento Común.
Para más ayuda, consulta la página de ayuda de Conocimiento Común.
Título canónico
Información procedente del conocimiento común inglés. Edita para encontrar en tu idioma.
Título original
Títulos alternativos
Información procedente del conocimiento común inglés. Edita para encontrar en tu idioma.
Fecha de publicación original
Personas/Personajes
Lugares importantes
Acontecimientos importantes
Películas relacionadas
Información procedente del conocimiento común inglés. Edita para encontrar en tu idioma.
Epígrafe
Dedicatoria
Primeras palabras
Citas
Últimas palabras
Aviso de desambiguación
Editores de la editorial
Blurbistas
Idioma original
Información procedente del conocimiento común inglés. Edita para encontrar en tu idioma.
DDC/MDS Canónico
LCC canónico

Referencias a esta obra en fuentes externas.

Wikipedia en inglés

Ninguno

Originally published in Poland in 1948, and acclaimed as one of the finest postwar Polish novels, Ashes and Diamonds takes place in the spring of 1945, as the nation is in the throes of its transformation to People' Poland. Communists, socialists, and nationalists; thieves and black marketeers; servants and fading aristocrats; veteran terrorists and bands of murderous children bewitched by the lure of crime and adventure--all of these converge on a provincial town's chief hotel, a microcosm of an uprooted world.

No se han encontrado descripciones de biblioteca.

Descripción del libro
Resumen Haiku

Debates activos

Ninguno

Cubiertas populares

Enlaces rápidos

Valoración

Promedio: (3.52)
0.5
1 1
1.5
2 5
2.5 2
3 10
3.5 3
4 12
4.5 6
5 4

¿Eres tú?

Conviértete en un Autor de LibraryThing.

 

Acerca de | Contactar | LibraryThing.com | Privacidad/Condiciones | Ayuda/Preguntas frecuentes | Blog | Tienda | APIs | TinyCat | Bibliotecas heredadas | Primeros reseñadores | Conocimiento común | 203,188,086 libros! | Barra superior: Siempre visible