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Poor lot of the farmers

RELATED STORIES

The Stakhanovite worker
Jan Józef Lipski Social activist
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Bohaterem numer jeden ówczesnej propagandy był przowodnik pracy, który wydobywał ileś tam węgla, układał jakieś zawrotne ilości cegieł, a działo się to albo kosztem życia ludzkiego, albo również i oszustwem – tak też bywało; a wzorem był Stachanow ze Związku Sowieckiego, o którym dziś wiemy, że to właśnie było oszustwo. I ci ludzie mieli przede wszystkim napędzać normy, to była... ich główne zadanie. W związku z tym byli straszliwie znienawidzeni przez swoich kolegów – co zrozumiałe.

The number one hero of the propaganda of those times was the Stakhanovite worker who would mine huge amounts of coal, lay a mind-boggling number of bricks while all of this was happening either at the cost of human lives or fraudulently because that happened, too. The model for this was Stakhanov of the Soviet Union about whom we now know that it was all fraudulent. These people were above all meant to increase the norms, that was their main task. Because of this they were loathed by their colleagues, which is understandable.

Jan Józef Lipski (1926-1991) was one of Poland's best known political activists. He was also a writer and a literary critic. As a soldier in the Home Army (Armia Krajowa), he fought in the Warsaw Uprising. In 1976, following worker protests, he co-founded the Workers' Defence Committee (KOR). His active opposition to Poland's communist authorities led to his arrest and imprisonment on several occasions. In 1987, he re-established and headed the Polish Socialist Party. Two years later, he was elected to the Polish Senate. He died in 1991 while still in office. For his significant work, Lipski was honoured with the Cross of the Valorous (Krzyż Walecznych), posthumously with the Grand Cross of the Order of Polonia Restituta (1991) and with the highest Polish decoration, the Order of the White Eagle (2006).

Listeners: Jacek Petrycki Marcel Łoziński

Cinematographer Jacek Petrycki was born in Poznań, Poland in 1948. He has worked extensively in Poland and throughout the world. His credits include, for Agniezka Holland, Provincial Actors (1979), Europe, Europe (1990), Shot in the Heart (2001) and Julie Walking Home (2002), for Krysztof Kieslowski numerous short films including Camera Buff (1980) and No End (1985). Other credits include Journey to the Sun (1998), directed by Jesim Ustaoglu, which won the Golden Camera 300 award at the International Film Camera Festival, Shooters (2000) and The Valley (1999), both directed by Dan Reed, Unforgiving (1993) and Betrayed (1995) by Clive Gordon both of which won the BAFTA for best factual photography. Jacek Petrycki is also a teacher and a filmmaker.

Film director Marcel Łoziński was born in Paris in 1940. He graduated from the Film Directing Department of the National School of Film, Television and Theatre in Łódź in 1971. In 1994, he was nominated for an American Academy Award and a European Film Academy Award for the documentary, 89 mm from Europe. Since 1995, he has been a member of the American Academy of Motion Picture Art and Science awarding Oscars. He lectured at the FEMIS film school and the School of Polish Culture of Warsaw University. He ran documentary film workshops in Marseilles. Marcel Łoziński currently lectures at Andrzej Wajda’s Master School for Film Directors. He also runs the Dragon Forum, a European documentary film workshop.

Tags: Alexey Stakhanov

Duration: 48 seconds

Date story recorded: October 1989

Date story went live: 09 March 2011