Jacques wygodzki

Jacques Wygodzki

Writer & Political Historian

Chronicling the lost political soul of interwar Polish Jewry

Paris — Born Jakub Wygodzki in Warsaw. Emigrated to France at age 8.

I am Jacques Wygodzki — though in my Polish editions, I insist the author is listed as Jakub Wygodzki, the name I carried when I left Warsaw in 1988. I write what I call "the room before the fire."

While most chronicle the Holocaust itself, I dedicate my pen to the decades that preceded it: the fierce parliamentary debates, the Zionist congresses, the desperate minority rights fights, and the vibrant political life of three million Polish Jews between 1918 and 1939. They were voters, doctors, revolutionaries, and dreamers before they became victims.

My Work

My political trilogy reconstructs the world that was erased:

Dans la tourmente des empires (2010) — WWI occupation of Vilna. A Jewish physician trapped between the German, Russian, and Polish armies.

L'enfer de la citadelle (2014) — Imprisonment in a German military citadel during the Great War. A meditation on political martyrdom and survival.

La table du député (2020) — 800 pages following a Jewish deputy in the Polish Sejm (1922–1939), navigating antisemitic legislation and the slow descent into authoritarianism.

I also publish extensively on Jewish medical history in Poland — documenting the physicians, epidemiologists, and public health advocates who served their communities and were later murdered or exiled.

Current Project

I am completing my magnum opus: Le Sejm des morts — a biographical reconstruction of every Jewish deputy who served in Poland's parliament between the wars. It is an act of political resurrection.

My Philosophy

Find Me

📍 Brussels ,
📚 Writing in French, insisting on Polish translations
✍️ Signed in Polish editions as Jakub Wygodzki