Scienceמאיר בוסאק

Meir Bosak

Meir Bosak was a Polish-born Israeli historian, writer and poet who survived the Holocaust with the help of Oskar Schindler.

1912 to 1992Research on Polish Jewish historyHebrew poetry and proseSurviving with Oskar Schindler's help

Born: 21 May 1912, Kraków
Died: 20 November 1992, Israel
Occupation: historian, educator, writer, poet
Education: University of Warsaw

Meir Bosak was born in 1912 in Kraków

Meir Bosak was born in Kraków, Poland, on 21 May 1912, to an old Kraków family. He attended a cheder and the Tachkemoni school, then finished at the Hebrew Gymnasium in Kraków.

He studied at the University of Warsaw and at the Institute for Jewish Studies in Warsaw. He earned a master's degree for a study of the history of Kraków Jewry in the 19th century, under Professor Meir Balaban. He then taught at the Hebrew Gymnasium in Kraków until World War II began.

During the war he was held in the Kraków Ghetto and later in the Płaszów camp. Oskar Schindler, a friend of the family, moved him to his factory at Brünnlitz, where he stayed until the war ended. Afterward he returned to Kraków and worked among the surviving Jewish community.

He married Lucia Panzer in 1946 and moved to Israel in 1949, settling in Tel Aviv. For many years he taught Bible and literature at the united high school in Rehovot. He published poetry, prose, studies on Polish Jewry and essays on Hebrew literature in Hebrew and Polish, and received several literary prizes. He died on 20 November 1992.