A LIFE ON THREE CONTINENTS – WITOLD LILIENTAL’S STORY
24 June 2025
Witold Liliental is a witness to history, having lived through the most significant events of the 20th century across three continents. He survived the Holocaust in Nazi-occupied Poland and experienced the apartheid era in South Africa. He then immigrated to the US and later to Canada. In June of 2025, his memoirs entitled ‘Two Worlds’ (in Polish: ‘Dwa swiaty’) were published under the auspices of the ‘NEVER AGAIN’ Association by the renowned publishing house Austeria. Currently, the memoirs are published in Polish only.
Dr Witold Liliental is a Polish-Canadian activist and a long-time supporter of the ‘NEVER AGAIN’ Association. He was born in 1939 in Warsaw on the eve of World War II, in an assimilated family with Jewish roots. His father, a reserve officer of the Polish Army, was killed in the Katyn massacre, perpetrated on Stalin’s order in 1940. His mother was actively involved in clandestine education activities under the German occupation. After the war, she left Poland with her son and settled in South Africa. Witold engaged in anti-racist activism against the apartheid regime. In 1959, he returned to Poland, where he graduated from the Warsaw University of Technology. In 1981, he moved to the US and ten years later to Canada.
In the ‘Two Worlds’, Witold Liliental writes, ‘Due to my own experience, I am allergic to any kind of racism and bigotry, and I watch in horror the ever-growing indifference of some parts of the Polish society to the suffering of other nations, as well as the increasing wave of racially motivated attacks. Of course, the great aid provided to the Ukrainian refugees has helped to improve the image of Polish people, but it is hard to forget the situation at the border with Belarus, where the refugees have a darker skin and pray to a different God. (…) I live in Canada, a country where multiculturalism and openness to the Other are cherished and practised. And I do envy that, as I dream that the same could happen in my first Homeland.’
Dr Anna Tatar from the ‘NEVER AGAIN’ Association says, ‘Witold Liliental’s book discusses transformative events in world history. But this epic story is bound together by a perspective of one man, who managed to intertwine his own experiences with a universal account of the human condition. His memoirs, written in a vivid language and full of anecdotes, serve as a tribute to diversity. The author values respect among people of various skin colours, roots, or religions, who create a community based on equal rights for everyone.’
Witold Liliental has collaborated with the ‘NEVER AGAIN’ Association for many years. He is a co-author of the ‘Brown Book’, a chronicle of racism and discrimination, and he has written numerous articles for the ‘NEVER AGAIN’ e-zine. His writings focused on, among other things, the persecution of the First Nations in Canada, the attack on the US Capitol in January 2021, and the legacy of apartheid in South Africa. Moreover, Liliental is a commentator of social and political events for the ‘Gazeta Wyborcza’ daily and ‘Angora’ weekly in Poland, among other press titles. He never hesitates to stand up for minorities, and he condemns all types of bigotry.
The ‘NEVER AGAIN’ Association is an independent civil society organisation founded in Warsaw in 1996. It has campaigned against racism, antisemitism, and xenophobia, for peace, intercultural dialogue, and human rights across the world. It has participated in important initiatives to commemorate the Holocaust and to combat Holocaust denial. In September 2024, ‘NEVER AGAIN’ was awarded the prestigious Ronald Eissens and Suzette Bronkhorst Award for ‘exceptional work in combatting online hate and promoting human rights’.
Austeria Publishing House focuses on publishing books related to Jewish subjects as well as Yiddish, Hebrew, Italian, French, German, and Hungarian literature. Its office is located in Kazimierz, an old Jewish district of Cracow, in a historic mikvah building, a Jewish ritual bath. In 2021, Austeria was awarded the title of the Ambassador of New Europe by the European Solidarity Centre in Gdansk.
Witold Liliental’s article: ‘South Africa – Land of my Youth’ (PDF in English).
More information:
www.NeverAgainAssociation.org
https://austeria.pl/en
www.facebook.com/Respect.Diversity
www.twitter.com/StowNIGDYWIECEJ
www.linkedin.com/company/never-again-association
https://neveragainnw.bsky.social