Thoughts of a Polish Jew

To Kasieńka from Grandpa is a document of a personal and family memory, authored by Artur Lilien-Brzozdowiecki (1890‒1958) in 1944/45. This memoir, which was written in Polish and translated to English for the family circulation alone, now becomes a public asset. Lilien invites his new-born granddaughter to encounter her family, generations of Polish Jewry: merchants, lease-holders, bankers, industrialists, politicians, communal leaders, army officers, scholars, physicians, artists, and art collectors. They dwell in a broad Jewish and Christian world, integrated into the national life of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, the Habsburg Empire, and the Second Polish Republic. The reader is encouraged to enjoy reminiscences of this worthy life and bitter choices that challenged Polish—particularly Galician—Jewry in the twentieth century.