Childhood Memories in the Spectral World

This essay combines autobiographical narrative with an analysis of the possibilities of dialogue with and understanding of another culture. Koczanowicz recounts his childhood in Legnica, Lower Silesia, and his encounter with the different cultures - Russian, Jewish, Ukranian, Lemko and Greek - represented by its inhabitants. Although the Germans who had built the town had been resettled after World War II, their dominant presence was felt in the background. Koczanowicz draws on philosophy and cultural studies to explore if and how it is possible to have a dialogue with a culture that has disappeared, leaving no more than material artefacts.