Iron or Steel: A Memoir on Living Dreams

Marek Maria Pienkowski was born in Lodz, Poland, on Sept. 8, 1945, with a hereditary title of nobility in the country enduring the tribulations of World War II longer than any other in Europe.

Pienkowski's rebellion against Poland's loss of independence after the war began at age five or six, when he became a founding member, with two friends, of the modestly-named Organization to Liberate Poland. The trio recognized that liberation required secret identities, so the author was Snake and hi...