Zofia Posmysz (1923–2022)

Zofia Posmysz was born to a Roman Catholic family in Kraków, Poland. She was 16 years old and attending a high school that specialized in business and economics when Nazi Germany invaded her country at the start of World War II. Her school was closed, so she attended underground classes arranged by the Polish resistance. In May 1942, she was arrested by the Gestapo for associating with fellow students who were distributing anti-Nazi leaflets, and sent to Auschwitz-Birkenau. She also survived forced labor at Budy and was later sent to Ravensbrück and Neustadt-Glewe camps before being liberated in May 1945. Afterwards, she walked the 500 miles back home to Kraków to be reunited with her mother; her father had been killed by the Germans. She later lived for many years in Warsaw with an older sister. She studied Polish literature at the University of Warsaw and became a newspaper journalist. She signed her first published article, a report on the Nuremberg war crimes trials, with the ID number tattooed on her arm: 7566. Ms. Posmysz began working for Polish state radio in the early 1950s, and rose to become director of the news editorial section in 1958. She wrote a semi-autobiographical radio play, "The Passenger in Cabin 45," which first aired in 1959. She later wrote a novella version that was translated into 15 languages. A film adaptation directed by Andrzej Munk was unfinished at his death in 1961, but later distributed. A renowned opera based on the radio play was composed by Mieczyslaw Weinberg with libretto by Alexander Medvedev. It was completed in 1968 but banned by the Soviets for years and finally premiered in 2010. Ms. Posmysz also wrote several other acclaimed works focused on the Holocaust.