WAŃKOWICZ Melchior
ON THE TRACKS OF THE SMETKA
4th ed. Warsaw 1936, Wydawn. Bibljoteka Polska, pp. [2] 372, 2 woodcuts, 2 five-color fold-out maps, 3 three-color inserts, 19 maps, plans and charts, 40 drawings, 172 photographs; format 16.5x25cm;
Woodcut by St. O. Chrostowski. Maps for the book were made under the leadership of Bogdan Zaborski.
On the Tracks of Smętek - a reportage novel by Melchior Wańkowicz, first published in 1936. According to the author himself, this was his first major work, created with a conscious literary intention.
In the novel, Wańkowicz describes his stay in the summer of 1935 in what was then East Prussia. It included a canoe trip in the "Kuwaka" with his younger daughter Marta "Tila" Wańkowicz on the rivers and lakes of the Masurian Lake District and a car tour of the rest of Warmia and Masuria. The trip is a pretext and canvas for historical, political and philosophical reflections on the intertwined, complicated over the centuries (from the "early" Teutonic Knights to the "early" Nazis) fate of the inhabitants of these lands: Mazurians, Poles and Germans.
Descriptions of the escalating violence and hatred of the population of German origin against the indigenous, Polish-speaking Mazurian population help to understand what was happening in this national melting pot on the eve of the outbreak of World War II. The novel also allows one to understand why the outcome of the 1920 plebiscite was a defeat for Polishness in these closely allied territories with Poland.
The book's success was enormous. It had as many as nine editions in less than four years. The last, ninth pre-war edition was seized by the Germans directly from the printing presses in Bydgoszcz. "Na tropach Smętka" was considered the most outstanding reportage volume of the interwar period.
"In view of the author's open hostility," the Gestapo banned the publication of Wańkowicz's book in Germany. After the outbreak of World War II, already during the September campaign, Wańkowicz was intensively sought by the Germans in connection with the authorship of this novel.
HARDCOVER HALF-LEATHER BINDING WITH EP. SPINE WITH RAISED SCROLLS, SIGNBOARD AND GILT LETTERING. RETAINED BOOKLET COVER
Condition DB+/ rubbing of binding, exlibris on front pastedown, EFFECTIVE piece
