The article compares two books being an attempt of the Polish literary community to settle with Stalinism: Rachunek pamięci (An Examination of Remembrance) under the joint scientific editorship of Władysław Bieńkowski, Helena Boguszewska, Paweł Jasienica, and Jerzy Kornacki; and Jacek Trznadel’s Hańba domowa (Home Disgrace). The study presents the circumstances of the creation of these two books and their reception, together with an analysis of the statements and opinions of writers contained in the text in terms of assessing literature in Stalinist times and the atmosphere in the literary milieu at the time, their attitude to settling accounts with the past and to the factors that determined the support of a large part of the community for...