---
product_id: 203736793
title: "Story of a Secret State: My Report to the World (Penguin Modern Classics) Paperback – 25 April 2019"
brand: "jan karskiandrew roberts"
price: "€ 25.26"
currency: EUR
in_stock: true
reviews_count: 8
url: https://www.desertcart.gr/products/203736793-story-of-a-secret-state-my-report-to-the-world
store_origin: GR
region: Greece
---

# Story of a Secret State: My Report to the World (Penguin Modern Classics) Paperback – 25 April 2019

**Brand:** jan karskiandrew roberts
**Price:** € 25.26
**Availability:** ✅ In Stock

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- **What is this?** Story of a Secret State: My Report to the World (Penguin Modern Classics) Paperback – 25 April 2019 by jan karskiandrew roberts
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## Customer Reviews

### ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ 5.0 out of 5 stars







  
  
    THE HORROR
  

*by N***R on Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 22 July 2013*

No-one had told me about Karski's book, and I am surprised it isn't better known. For one thing, it sheds some light on the circumstances in which news of the atrocities perpetrated against European Jews was conveyed from wartime Poland to unbelievers in London and Washington. For another, although it was dictated in Polish and translated into English at great speed in a Manhattan hotel room, it is well-constructed and beautifully written - as good in its own way as such 1930s and 1940s classics as Orwell's Homage to Catalonia and Koestler's Scum of the Earth, Primo Levi's If this is a man. Karski was an officer in the Polish Army in 1939, and he entered the underground where, whatever he tells you about his own prudence, he proved to be stubbornly and ridiculously courageous He took charge of propaganda - at his instigation Poles got to read uncensored news compiled in cellars from radio reports and printed on hand-cranked presses. Karski is a literalist, a patriot and a consummate observer. He was told by his underground superiors to be objective, and so he proved to be.What could seem detached or even cold in other, easier contexts is the way he is able to make sense of ultimate atrocity. He dresses as a Ukrainian guard to observe the killing of trainloads of Jews in quicklime, and he notes not his own distress but the prostration as a consequence of nausea that he experienced.(His dispatch describing this event was read out on the BBC by the writer Arthur Koestler; Karski was the first person to witness the genocide and speak about it.) He doesn't tell you what he felt in Washington but those interested should look at Claude Lanzmann's filmed interview The Karski Report in which he describes how the Supreme Court judge Felix Frankfurter told him that he didn't think Karski was lying but nonetheless couldn't believe him. There are books that you are told you must read because they are great literature. Karski's is among those which one must read not merely because they told the truth, but because they remind the reader that it is possible to do so, and that, maybe not in the way that one might have hoped or expected, telling the truth does make a difference.

### ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ 5.0 out of 5 stars







  
  
    Deeply, unforgettably, moving
  

*by P***R on Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 10 June 2011*

I have heard stories of the deprivations and depravities incurred on the Jews in Poland during WW2, but rarely as such moving first-hand testimony. Indeed my own father-in-law was escaping on a train crossing the Polish - German border on the very night that Karski was conscripted. Karski's remarkable account must be read in the knowledge that the war was still underway when published. For this understandable reason, there are important facts and events missing, some of which are helpfully appended to this edition. I was deeply moved by his account, not least his ability to report with evident feeling and passion, yet remain absolutely objective when faced with sights so appalling.  His description of the loading of death-camp cattle trucks with 140 souls in each and the subsequent carnage is something that I will never forget. He clearly understood that objective personal testimony, not raw emotion, was vital in ensuring his credibility.Karski's account finishes rather abruptly with the delivery of his message to the Allies. Being the consummate diplomat, he plays down, or simply does not report, the pitiful responses from the Western leaders to the plight of the Polish people and the Jews in particular. For example, during his 1943 interview in Washington with Justice of the US Supreme Court Frankfurter, himself Jewish, he was told "Mr. Karski, I want to be totally frank. I am unable to believe you. I did not say [you are] lying. I am just unable to believe what [you] told me."Jan Karski was honoured as a "Righteous among the Nations" at Yad Vashem on 2nd June 1982.This book sold 400,000 copies in the US alone when published there in 1944. It is remarkable that it has not been published in the UK until now.A remarkable story, told by a remarkable man.

### ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ 5.0 out of 5 stars







  
  
    Reality surpassing fiction
  

*by A***R on Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 17 May 2011*

Jan Karski appears to deserve all the awards of praise that he received during his exciting and often tragic life. This book is quite remarkable and is written with a degree of objectivity that probably could only come from a great journalist or a diplomat. Yet the book reads like a thriller while simultaneously being highly instructive and appearing to impart the atmosphere of a martyrized country under Nazi domination. The only aspect somewhat odd to the modern eye is the way that he quotes dialogue and conversations as if they were recorded. I suspect that Mr Karski had a most excellent memory, but was it really photographic? Despite this I would highly recommend this book.

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*Store origin: GR*
*Last updated: 2026-02-24*