Last farewell
It is always hard to bid farewell to a man called before his time. Especially an outstanding one.
Jerzy Targalski was truly multifaceted. He was a valued expert on political transformations in Central and Eastern Europe, an excellent lecturer, a prolific author and a sharp polemicist. As a staunch oppositionist of communist rule, he published underground literature. He was a historian, a graduate of Ancient East Philology, and used upwards of ten modern languages in his ongoing work. Mr Targalski published works related to history and contemporary politics. He was a researcher and academic, but he above all valued current politics, journalism and heated discussions. As one of his friends recalls, „he raised a generation of experts on Russia and Eastern Europe.” His former students remember him as a very demanding lecturer (passing the exams often required several attempts). He expected not only knowledge but, above all, analytical and, critical thinking. He required a constant exchange between defending and playing the devil advocate. However, he never forced his own strong views on his pupils. His former students and later collaborators emphasize how much weight he attached to the ability to use a region’s native languages, which allowed them to utilize primary sources of information. They also noted his foretelling abilities highlighting that already in 1990, i.e. in the era preceding the Internet boom and the rapid development of social media, he published a brochure describing disinformation techniques.
Jerzy Targalski’s associates also remember him as an ardent supporter of building a strong bloc of states between Germany and Russia, an advocate of developing Polish-Ukrainian, Polish-Lithuanian and Polish-Belarusian alliances. He believed that the way to build Poland’s strength was to build an understanding between these countries and nations.
Jerzy Targalski collaborated from 1976 with the Workers’ Defense Committee (KOR), was a distributor and creator of independent underground magazines. He collaborated with „Głos” and the publishing house „Krąg”. He participated in the creation of the samizdat periodicals „Niepodległość” and „Obóz.” After the imposition of martial law, he was active in the underground until 1983 when he emigrated to France. He collaborated with „Kontakt” and the Paris-based „Kultura”. After his return from exile, he was the director and editor-in-chief of PAI-Press and the director of PAI-Internet. Between 2006 and 2009 he was a board member of the Polish Radio. He was a blogger and collaborator of Gazeta Polska and Telewizja Republika.
He died on September 19 at the age of 69.
