Last-minute holiday shopping for your loved ones? Why not get them some fabulous books by Polish authors in English translation? Here are our recommendations for you, including fiction, history, children's books and more!
Wislawa Szymborska became Poland's fourth Nobel Prize winner in 1994. Map: Collected and Last Poems brings together new and classic translations of her work across six decades, including the entirety of Enough, the final collection published before she died in 2012. Szymborska remains one of Poland's most popular writers, and her work is beloved by readers all around the world.
For the kids in your family,Maps by Aleksandra Mizielinska and Daniel Mizielinski is the perfect gift for inquisitive explorers. A worldwide hit that features 52 exquisitely detailed maps of the world's countries and continents, Maps is littered with illustrations about local culture, flora, fauna and geographical features. This book is a treasure trove for children and grown-ups alike.
If you love detective novels, Poland's no. 1 crime writer Zygmunt Miloszewski is sure to please. His bestseller A Grain of Truth was dramatized as a film this year, directed by Borys Lankosz and featuring Polish movie star Robert Wieckiewicz in the leading role. Why not check out the original book - and get ready for Miloszewski's latest book, Rage, coming out in English next year!
When Miron Bialoszewski published his riveting Memoir of the Warsaw Uprising in 1970, censorship meant parts of the book had to be removed. This new edition features a revised translation with the censored passages restored - for the first time offering American readers to experience this immortal classic in full.
One of the most exciting voices in Polish poetry today is Tomasz Rozycki. His fourth book in English, Twelve Stations, has been shortlisted this year for a PEN Translation Award, honoring Bill Johnston's masterful rendering. The book - an epic poem centered on Rozycki's home city of Opole, and the displaced people who settled in the city after the war - won Poland's prestigious Koscielski Prize in 2004.
This year saw the latest book by one of the stars of Polish reportage, Wojciech Jagielski's Burning the Grass: At the Heart of Change in South Africa 1990-2011. Telling the story of the life and mysterious death of Eugene Terre'Blanche, a pro-Apartheid militant, Jagielski lifts the lid on life in rural, Afrikaaner South Africa, where little has changed since the introduction of democracy in 1994.
For something lighter, Andrzej Bursa's Killing Auntie is a short masterpiece of dark comedy. When Jurek, a young student, kills his doting aunt out of boredom, he faces nearsighted relatives, false-toothed grandmothers, meat grinders and lovemaking lynxes, as a whole society gets caught up in disposing of dear old Auntie.
The first translation into English of this classic of Polish literature, Emancipated Women by Boleslaw Prus tells the story of Magdalena Brzeska, a naive altruist trying to make her way in 19th century Polish society. Though written over a hundred years ago, the book is startlingly relevant, with a charming, sprightly writing style that makes it ideal for a modern reader.
Last but not least, why not check out The Coffee Mill, a classic children's fairy-tale by the legendary poet, playwright and humorist Konstanty Ildefons Galczynski. A coffee grinder is thrown away by its owners and goes wandering through Earth and outer space, trying to find where it belongs. This interactive, digital translation is available for download online.
www.polishculture-nyc.org
KATALOG FIRM W INTERNECIE
