STEFAN GRABÍNSKI (1887-1936) “a Polish writer of horror fiction who considered himself an expert on demonology and magic. Some critics have called him the ‘Polish Poe’ or the ‘Polish Lovecraft,’ and suggested he believed in the supernatural forces in his stories.” – from Weird Fiction Review Biography on Culture.pl ESSAYS ON GRABINSKI’S WORKS
BRUNO SCHULZ (1892-1942) “Writer painter, illustrator and graphic artist known for short story collections that bring back the magical reality of Poland’s pre-war shtetls…Schulz’s output as a writer was relatively modest in terms of quantity, but exceptionally rich in quality and subject matter. It consists of two volumes of short stories – The Street of
JACEK DUKAJ The Old Axolotl: Hardware Dreams, translated by Stanley Bill (Allegro, 2015). “The Old Axolotl is an exhilarating post-apocalyptic tale about a world in which a cosmic catastrophe has sterilized the Earth of all living things. Only a small number of humans have managed to copy digitalized versions of their minds onto hardware in
ANDRZEJ SAPKOWSKI (b. 1948) “An economist by education, Sapkowski worked in foreign trade from 1972-94. He is a five-time winner of the Janusz A. Zajdel Award, the most important honour for fantasy writers in Poland. He received Polityka magazine’s Literature Passport in 1997. What’s more, Sapkowski’s popularity is not limited to Poland; his novels have
OLGA TOKARCZUK (b. 1962) “Tokarczuk is one of the most critically acclaimed and most translated Polish writers, with House of Day, House of Night and Primeval and Other Tales being her greatest commercial and critical successes. She studied psychology at the University of Warsaw and lives in Wałbrzych. An outstanding writer, essayist and a devotee
STANISLAW LEM (1921-2006) “Stanisław Lem, the Polish novelist, futurologist, literary theorist, satirist, and philosophical gadfly, tried mightily to free his work from the shackles of the present. In dozens of novels, short stories, essays, metaliterary experiments, and futurological treatises, he attempted to imagine everything from a living ocean that could read human minds (Solaris) to
WITOLD GOMBROWICZ (1904-1969) “Gombrowicz is one of the most exceptional writers in the history of literature, at least in terms of his philosophy, his method of constructing texts and the power of his language. He fought endlessly against Polish tradition and history, but this was only the starting point. His work was deeply rooted in
originally published in Polish in 1961 first translated into English from the French version (by Jean-Michel Jasiensko, 1966) by Joanna Kilmartin and Steve Cox (1970) first direct Polish-to-English translation by Bill Johnston (2011) grab a copy at your local bookstore or here VARIOUS TRANSLATIONS
The Dedalus Book of Polish Fantasy, edited and translated by Wiesiek Powaga (Dedalus, 1996). “This anthology of fiction traces Polish literature’s extensive and continuing dialogue with the Devil. In nineteen selections from eighteen authors, editor and translator Powoga collects the best representatives of this tradition from the past century.“ Stories include: “Co-existence” by Stanisław
OVERVIEW Polish SFT is a wonderful mix of science fiction and surrealism, fantasy and horror, cyberpunk and fairy tale. Since the 1960s, when Stanisław Lem, Witold Gombrowicz, and Stefan Grabiński were first translated and introduced to Anglophone audiences; to the present day, when Andrzej Sapkowski’s Witcher universe is available in English across various media; Polish
