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9 February 2010

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Stanisław Barańczak
languages: Polish  / English  / German 
 

A poet, translator, literary critic, essayist, scholar, editor and lecturer born in Poznań in 1946.

He studied Polish at the Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań, where he became a lecturer and earned his Ph.D. He broke into print as a poet and critic in 1965. Barańczak was on the staff of the Poznań magazine "Nurt" from 1967-1971. After the political events of June, 1976, he became a co-founder of the Committee for the Defense of the Workers and of the clandestine quarterly "Zapis". He has lectured on Polish literature at Harvard since 1981 and is editor of "The Polish Review". He was a co-founder of the Paris "Zeszyty Literackie" in 1983, and is a regular contributor to the periodical "Teksty Drugie".

He is a leading poet in the "New Wave" and one of the outstanding Polish writers to begin his career in the communist period, combining literary work with scholarship and politics. He is the most prominent translator in recent years of English poetry into Polish and of Polish poetry into English.

His Polish is permeated with the language of the poets he feels closest to - Emily Dickinson, John Donne and Robert Frost - and whose work he has made popular in Poland. The original poetry of Stanisław Barańczak is clearly dominated by three concerns: the ethical, the political, and the literary. His language is extraordinarily supple. His choice of subjects testifies to his community engagement; his language is always amazingly fluent. It may seem paradoxical that Barańczak began as a poetic critic of language and the social order but has achieved his greatest success as a late-twentieth-century Parnassist, a virtuoso of poetic form.

His most recent book, "Chirurgiczna precyzja / Surgical Precision", won the 1999 Nike prize.

Selected Bibliography

Poetry:
  • "Korekta twarzy (Facial Corrections)", Poznań: Wydawnictwo Poznańskie, 1968.
  • "Jednym tchem (Without Stopping for Breath)", Warsaw: Orientacja, 1970.
  • "Dziennik poranny (Morning Journal)", Poznań: Wydawnictwo Poznańskie, 1968.
  • "Sztuczne oddychanie (Artificial Respiration)", London: Aneks, 1978.
  • "Ja wiem, że to niesłuszne (I Know It's Not Right)", Paris: Instytut Literacki, 1977.
  • "Tryptyk z betonu, zmęczenia i śniegu (Triptych with Concrete, Fatigue and Snow)", Krakow: KOS, 1980.
  • "Atlantyda i inne wiersze z lat 1981-85 (Atlantis and Other Poems)", London: Puls, 1986.
  • "Widokówka z tego świata (A Postcard from this World)", Paris: Zeszyty Literackie, 1988.
  • "159 wierszy 1968-88 (159 Poems)", Krakow: Znak, 1990.
  • "Podróż zimowa (Journey in Winter)", Poznań: a5, 1994.
  • "Zimy i podróże (Winter and Journeys)", Krakow: WL, 1997.
  • "Chirurgiczna precyzja (Surgical Precision)", Krakow: a5, 1998.
Light verse:
  • "Biografioly: poczet 56 jednostek sławnych, sławetnych i osławionych (Biographies of 56 Celebrated, Famous or Notorious Individuals)", Poznań: a5, 1991.
  • "Zwierzęca zajadłość: z zapisków zniechęconego zoologa (Animal Ferocity: From the Notes of a Discouraged Zoologist)", Poznań: a5, 1991.
  • "Slon, trąba i ojczyzna (The Elephant, the Trunk, and the Polish Question)", Krakow: Znak, 1995.
Literary criticism:
  • "Ironia i harmonia (Irony and Harmony)", Warsaw: Czytelnik, 1973.
  • "Język poetycki Mirona Białoszewskiego (Miron Białoszewski's Poetic Language)", Wroclaw: Ossolineum, 1974.
  • "Etyka i poetyka (Ethics and Poetics)", Paris: Instytut Literacki, 1979.
  • "Ksiażki najgorsze 1975-1980 (The Worst Books)", Krakow: KOS, 1981.
  • "Uciekinier z utopii. O poezji Zbigniewa Herberta (Fugitive from Utopia: On the Poetry of Zbigniew Herbert)", London: Polonia, 1984.
  • "Tablica z Macondo. Osiemnaście prób wytłumaczenia, po co i dlaczego się pisze (A License Plate from Macondo: Eighteen Attempts at Explaining Why One Writes)", London: Aneks, 1990.
  • "Ocalone w tłumaczeniu. Szkice o warsztacie tłumaczenia poezji (Saved in Translation: Sketches on the Craft of Translating Poetry)", Poznań: a5, 1992.
  • "Poezja i duch uogolnienia. Wybór esejów 1970-1995 (Poetry and the Spirit of Generalization: Selected Essays)", Krakow: Znak, 1996.
Selected translations:
  • published in English: "The Weight of the Body: Selected Poems", Chicago: Another Chicago Press/TriQuarterly, 1989. "A Fugitive from Utopia: The Poetry of Zbigniew Herbert", Cambridge MA: Harvard University Press, 1987.
  • published in German (anthologies): "Panorama der polnischen Literatur des 20. Jahrhunderts", Zürich: Ammann, 1997. "Polnische Lyrik aus 100 Jahren", Gifkendorf: Merlin, 1997.

Source: www.polska2000.pl; Copyright: Stowarzyszenie Willa Decjusza.

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