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There has never been a book quite like this before! Today an exceptional volume landed in bookstores, taking readers on a journey through times of great upheaval and renaissance of Polish local government. The latest book by Europa Nostra Vice-President, Prof. Jacek Purchla, entitled “Kraków 1990. At the Turn of the Epoch,” reveals the secrets of the city during the major transformation of the 1980s and 1990s. The author — a distinguished Cracovian and the city’s deputy mayor from 1990 to 1991 — combines erudition with a rare ability to blend historical analysis with the experience of a witness and participant in these historic events, creating a remarkable work.
“What was our Kraków’s true ‘joy from the reclaimed dump’? How do we tell that story, and what lessons can we draw from it? The city’s history, especially its pivotal turning points, cannot be built on myths but must be based on facts and their resulting analyses,” outlines Prof. Jacek Purchla’s aim in creating his opus magnum. Over 352 pages, he dispels the myths, ambiguities, and omissions that have accumulated around the regime and political changes of 1990 in Kraków.
He offers readers a powerful work — literally and figuratively. Weighing precisely 1.6 kg, it is not only a chronicle and a story of how people faced new challenges or an kaleidoscope of events on the “Kraków stage” but above all, a fascinating study of systemic change and the birth of local government in Poland.
The primary source of this analysis is Prof. Purchla’s documents from 1989–1991, collected in the National Archives in Kraków, comprising approximately 9,500 pages and 63 boxes, including three DVDs. These relate to his activities in the Kraków Civic Committee and his period as Vice-Mayor of Kraków in those formative years.
Published by the Academic Bookstore, “Kraków 1990. At the Turn of the Epoch” by Prof. Jacek Purchla is a must-read for anyone wishing to understand today’s Kraków. To do so, one must travel back 35 years — to the time of Kraków’s local government renaissance. Thanks to the author, this journey is not only possible but exceedingly captivating. Prof. Waldemar Łazuga sums up his impressions, describing this publication as “one of those rare books from which it is hard to tear oneself away.”