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Contributor

Ryszard Krynicki

Contributor

Ryszard Krynicki

Ryszard Krynicki, one of the most prominent poets of postwar Poland, was born in 1943 in Sankt Valentin, Austria, where his parents had been deported to a Nazi labor camp. In Poland in the 1960s he became a leading member of the "New Wave" group of poets, which included Adam Zagajewski and Stanislaw Baranczak. He was co-editor of Zapis, the first independent literary magazine in Communist Poland to be published outside the reach of official censorship. He made his debut in 1968 with the collection Speed of Chase, Speed of Flight, and after the publication of his second collection, Collective Organism, in a form severely cut by censorship, his work was published by the Institut Littéraire in Paris and by underground presses in Poland. His most recent collection, Magnetic Point, was published in 1996. Krynicki is a distinguished translator of German-language poetry, in particular of Paul Celan and Nelly Sachs. He has received many awards, among them the Polish Poets' Award, the Koscielski Foundation Award, and the Robert Graves-PEN Club Award. Since 1989 he has run the prestigious independent publishing house a5, which publishes Wislawa Szymborska, Zbigniew Herbert, Adam Zagajewski and the work of many younger Polish poets, as well as literary essays and poetry in translation.

Articles by Ryszard Krynicki

A Stone from New World
By Ryszard Krynicki
Only when I turned it over on its other side did I see that the heavy sandstone circle which looked like the top half of a mill
Translated from Polish by Alissa Valles
Rue de Poitiers
By Ryszard Krynicki
A late afternoon, snow is falling.
Translated from Polish by Alissa Valles
Sweet, innocent
By Ryszard Krynicki
Sweet, innocent words,
Translated from Polish by Alissa Valles
Return from Assisi
By Ryszard Krynicki
A mutilated Giotto. A loud: Silenzio!
Translated from Polish by Alissa Valles
After Rain
By Ryszard Krynicki
Brother and sister, inscrutable sphinx, noble snail:
Translated from Polish by Alissa Valles
The Museum of Fine Arts in Budapest
By Ryszard Krynicki
How did you find yourself here, / poor mummy of an Egyptian princess,
Translated from Polish by Alissa Valles
He Who Always Knows
By Ryszard Krynicki
He who always knowsto which god he prays,will never be heard.
Translated from Polish by Alissa Valles
Buddha, Christ
By Ryszard Krynicki
Buddha, Christ,in vain you are hidingin so many incarnations.
Translated from Polish by Alissa Valles
Job’s Guilt
By Ryszard Krynicki
Everything was fulfilled,I was spared nothing.Who will forgive me.
Translated from Polish by Alissa Valles
Who Doesn’t Exist
By Ryszard Krynicki
Fear Godwho doesn’t existin your heart.
Translated from Polish by Alissa Valles
This Year
By Ryszard Krynicki
This yearI bore no fruitonly leavesthat give no shadeI’m afraid, Rabbi,I’m afraid, Lord,that a hungryweary man curses meon the endless roadto Jerusalem
Translated from Polish by Alissa Valles
(from Meister Eckhardt or Zohar?)
By Ryszard Krynicki
nothing, God
Translated from Polish by Alissa Valles
Fragments from the year 1989
By Ryszard Krynicki
. . .Mute,my head covered,I stand with a pebble on my lipsin front of a wall of fireand oblivioncountedamong the helpersof death. . .Take the ash from me,take the weight from me it’s notmy fault,…
Translated from Polish by Alissa Valles
Save Me, Guide Me
By Ryszard Krynicki
Save me, shield me, faithful journey,from my own lies and from our era.Protect me, you, Angel and Guardian,but you, White Cloud, guide me.Keep me from thunder, hurricane,immaculate truth, give me light.Don’t…
Translated from Polish by Alissa Valles