921.6 Aschk

In 1945, Warsaw’s prewar Jewish district, Muranów, lay in ruins. Almost no physical sites of Warsaw’s once rich Jewish history remained standing after the Holocaust. How have the residents of Warsaw – mostly non-Jews – dealt with the memories of this obliterated and ruined space? This article discusses from 1945 to the present several important attempts among largely non-Jewish Poles to remember and reflect upon the history of Warsaw’s Jewish past in the district of Muranów. Even though the tendency has in general been to forget, efforts to remember the Nazi past have surfaced during the last decades. The essay therefore suggests that the postwar history of memory in Warsaw may be thought of not in linear terms but rather in terms of multiple layers of memories that interact in complex ways over time.