Yitzhok Katzenelson’s "Dos lid funem oysgehargetn yidishn folk" : in Polish

Katzenelson’s Song of the Murdered Jewish People is widely recognized as one of the most significant literary documents of the Shoah. Hence, its very limited reception after WW2 is at first glance baffling. We provide the necessary historical background to explain why Katzenelson’s “Lament” was for several decades unwanted and why it still remains difficult to appropriate in translation. To show this in one particular context, we focus on the Polish translation by Jerzy Ficowski. We analyse selected examples of Ficowski’s justly praised poetic achievement to point out the limitations of his declared goal: “My intention was to make the translation invisible, to allow the murdered poet say again the same – but this time, in Polish” (Ficowski 1982: 11).