KF Online Programs

Family Roots in Poland - Prof. Norman Davies in conversation with Lord Daniel Finkelstein

Thursday, June 23, 2022, at 12:00pm

The Kosciuszko Foundation and the Project on Poland Past and Present invite you to a webinar featuring 

Professor Norman Davies in conversation with Lord Daniel Finkelstein about his Family Roots in Poland 

Thursday, June 23, 2022

12 PM (NYC)/ 5 PM (London)/ 18:00 (Warsaw, Poland)

The webinar will feature eminent historian Professor Norman Davies in conversation with Lord Daniel Finkelstein about the search for his family roots in Poland and tumultuous periods in Poland's history. Lord Finkelstein is a British journalist and politician, a member of the House of Lords, a former executive editor of The Times, and the paper's weekly political columnist. His father was born in Lviv (then in Poland, now Ukraine) and became Professor at City University London, his mother, Mirjam Finkelstein, was a Holocaust survivor. Lord Finkelstein's grandfather, Dr. Alfred Wiener, was a Jewish activist and founder of the Wiener Library, the world's oldest institution devoted to studying the Holocaust.

This is the final episode in the "Studying Poland Today" webinar series presented jointly by the Kosciuszko Foundation and the Project on Poland Past and Present (PPPP) aiming to raise the level of expert knowledge about Poland in foreign countries and strengthen Polish Studies in the universities of the English-speaking world.

Norman Davies first visited Poland in March 1962, when he was still a student in his final year at Oxford. Fascinated by what he learned, and by what the authorities did not want him to learn, he made the study of Polish history the starting point of his academic career. His early books – White Eagle, Red Star: the Polish-Soviet War of 1919-20, (1972), God's Playground: a history of Poland (1981), and Heart of Europe: the past in Poland's present (1984) – were banned by the censorship of the Soviet Block and long unavailable to Polish readers. As a successful historian writing in English, however, he rapidly gained a worldwide readership and devoted himself to informing the world about Poland. His books have been translated into over thirty languages including Chinese, Japanese, Russian, Ukrainian, Spanish, German, Italian, and French. Over the years, Prof. Davies received many honors and distinctions. He was elected Fellow of the British Academy (1997) and was awarded the Order of the White Eagle, Poland's highest order. 

Daniel Finkelstein is a leading British journalist and politician, and a member of the British House of Lords. He has held various key advisory roles within the Conservative Party including being Director of the Conservative Research Department, Director of the Social Market Foundation think tank, and Chairman of Policy Exchange. Lord Finkelstein was Editor of Connexion,  Britain's first internet, and data communications newspaper. He became Executive Editor of The Times and remains Associate Editor and a weekly political columnist. He also has a regular column in The Jewish Chronicle. He is a graduate of the London School of Economics and City University London. In 1997, he was awarded an Order of the British Empire (OBE).

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