Stanisław Mackiewicz Explained

Stanisław Mackiewicz
Office:Prime Minister of Poland
Termlabel:In exile
Term Start:8 June 1954
Term End:21 June 1955
President:August Zaleski
Predecessor:Jerzy Hryniewski
Successor:Hugon Hanke
Office2:Member of the Sejm
Term Start2:1928
Term End2:1935
Birth Date:1896 12, df=yes
Birth Place:Saint Petersburg, Russia
Death Place:Warsaw, Poland
Restingplace:Powązki Cemetery, Warsaw
Nationality:Polish
Party:BBWR
Occupation:Politician, writer

Stanisław "Cat" Mackiewicz (18 December 1896 in Saint Petersburg, Russia – 18 February 1966 in Warsaw, Poland) was a conservative Polish writer, journalist and monarchist.

The interwar journalist Adolf Maria Bocheński called him the foremost political journalist of the interbellum Second Polish Republic.[1]

Life

Mackiewicz was born into a Polish family that had historically used the Bożawola coat-of-arms.Mackiewicz joined the Polish Military Organisation in 1917 and served as a volunteer in the Polish Army during the Polish-Soviet War of 1919–21. He published and served as the editor-in-chief of the independent Wilno (Vilnius) periodical titled "Słowo," wholly financially supported by the noble families of the former Grand Duchy of Lithuania. He actively promoted the idea of the so-called Jagellonian Poland, i.e., return to the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth style of governance in Eastern Europe.

He supported Józef Piłsudski[2] and in 1928–35 served as a deputy to the Sejm (Poland's parliament), representing the Piłsudskiite Nonpartisan Bloc for Cooperation with the Government.

After Piłsudski's death in 1935, Mackiewicz criticized the ruling elite and in 1939 was imprisoned for 17 days at the Bereza Kartuska detention camp.

On 18 September 1939, a day after the Soviet attack on eastern Poland during the Soviet-German Invasion of Poland, he left Poland.

Following the Yalta Conference and subsequent occupation by Stalin of Poland and the later establishment of the Communist Poland, Mackiewicz, like so many other political exiles, remained abroad and was politically active in the Polish émigré community. He served as prime minister of the Polish government-in-exile in 1954–55.

In 1956, Mackiewicz returned to Poland, where he continued writing under the pseudonym of Gaston de Cerizay.[3] In 1964 he was one of the signatories of the so-called Letter of 34 to Prime Minister Józef Cyrankiewicz regarding freedom of culture.

He was the older brother of ardent enemy of the communist system, writer Józef Mackiewicz.

Works

See also

Notes and References

  1. http://www.rp.pl/artykul/423593.html Piotr Zychowicz: W obronie Stanisława Augusta
  2. http://www.rp.pl/artykul/517910.html Krzysztof Masłoń: Błazeńska czapka Cata-Mackiewicza
  3. Neubauer, John (editor) 2009 The Exile and Return of Writers from East-Central Europe: A Compendium, Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co, Berlin (p. 177)