2007 Recipient

The Kulczycki Book Prize in Polish Studies (formerly the Orbis Book Prize), established in 1996 and sponsored by the Kulczycki family, former owners of the Orbis Books Ltd. of London, England, is awarded annually for the best book in any discipline, on any aspect of Polish affairs, published in the previous calendar year.

Co-Winner: Marci Shore
Title: Caviar and Ashes: A Warsaw Generation’s Life and Death in Marxism, 1918-1968 (Yale University Press)

Marci Shore’s magisterial account of a generation of Warsaw literati tells one of the most important Polish stories of the 20th century. This thoroughly researched and compellingly narrated book is full of revealing detail about a cohort of intellectuals who shaped much of Poland’s post-war history. Shore traces a group of artists and writers whose life and work were all defined by their relationship to Marxism. By bridging the temporal boundaries in 20th century Polish history, she demonstrates the continuities in Polish intellectual life even in the face of the disjuncture of the Soviet imposition of communism. Moreover, she gracefully integrates a discussion of what it meant to be an assimilated Jew in modern Poland into her analysis.

Co-Winner: Geneviève Zubrzycki