Memoirs about the Reduta and Juliusz Osterwa Written down by Reduta Members in 1947–1949

Ewa Dulna-Rak, ed.

University of Warsaw (Poland)
https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7067-8285

Wanda Świątkowska, ed.

Jagiellonian University in Kraków (Poland)
https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8470-5643

Abstract

This is an annotated critical edition of memoirs about Reduta and Juliusz Osterwa written by his associates in the years 1947–1949. They are kept in the Historical Museum of the City of Kraków, to which they were donated in 1993 by Jerzy Zajączkowski. The collection contains eight memoirs (in descriptive form and as letters) and three responses to a questionnaire containing twenty-seven questions about Reduta and Osterwa. The authors of the memoirs are: Adam Bunsch, Włodzimierz Chełmicki, Jan Ciecierski, Halszka Kamocka, Aleksandra Rostkowska, Andrzej Rybicki, Alfred Szymański, Irena Netto, and Halina Gallowa. The authorship of one questionnaire could not be established. This collection contains valuable information about work at Reduta, the way the group worked and functioned, Osterwa's direction and the process of preparing performances, as well as everyday life at Reduta. The authors remember Juliusz Osterwa as an artist, pedagogue, director, and actor, but also as a private person, describing his relationships with co-workers, his character, manner and personal preferences. The memoirs collected here are published for the first time and as such are valuable factographic material for research into the history of Reduta and the biography of its founder.

Keywords:

Reduta, Polish theater after 1945, memoirs, theater history