
Story of a Secret State
Penguin Modern Classics
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Narrated by:
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Janusz Guttner
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By:
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Jan Karski
I do not pretend to have given an exhaustive picture of the Polish Underground, its organisation and its activities. Because of our methods, I believe that there is no one today who could give an all-embracing recital...This book is a purely personal story, my story.
Jan Karski's Second World War memoir is a heroic act of witness: the courageous testimony of a man who risked everything for his country. First published in 1944, the book became an instant best seller in the US while the war still raged in Europe. At times overwhelming in the details it reveals of the suffering of ordinary people, it is an unforgettable and deeply affecting record of brutality, courage, and survival under conditions of extreme bleakness.
During the first four years of World War II, Karski worked as a messenger for the underground, risking his life in secret missions. He was captured, tortured, rescued, smuggled through a tunnel into the Warsaw ghetto and, finally, disguised himself as a guard to infiltrate a Nazi death camp. Then, travelling across occupied Europe to England, with his eye-witness report smuggled on microfilm in the handle of a razor, he became the first man to tell the Allies about the Holocaust - only to be ignored.
©1944 Jan Karski (P)2011 Penguin AudioListeners also enjoyed...




















Critic reviews
gripping and educational
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Amazing look at the Polish Underground during WWII
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I would hope that this book will be listened to by many.
Highly recommended.The authors' modesty, courage,loyalty and dedication shine throughout the book.How proud I would be to have known him.
Excellent narration,the fact that the narrator has a mid-European accent to his English added flavour and reality,as though the author himself were relating his testimony from those dark days.Lest we forget.
Outstanding
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History will always repeat itself!
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Excellent.
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Informative and interesting
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So much to learn about Poland and world war 2
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Leszcz
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Powerful & gripping story
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In short, this is a thrilling read.
The former Foreign Minister of Poland Władysław Bartoszewski in his speech at the ceremony of the 60th anniversary of the liberation of the concentration camp at Auschwitz-Birkenau, 27 January 2005, said:
"The Polish resistance movement kept informing and alerting the free world to the situation. In the last quarter of 1942, thanks to the Polish emissary Jan Karski and his mission, and also by other means, the Governments of the United Kingdom and of the United States were well informed about what was going on in Auschwitz-Birkenau."
Among much recognition and adulation bestowed upon him, Jan Karski, posthumously, received the Presidential Medal of Freedom from U.S. President Barack Obama on April 23, 2012.
See the write-up at wikipedia under "Jan Karski."
The narrator, Janusz Guttner, was brilliant... the best choice to read this magnificent book.
I cannot recommend this listen enough.
Magnificent, Spellbinding, Intriguing, Inspiring
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