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Zbigniew Herbert
Zbigniew Herbert (Polish: [ˈzbiɡɲɛf ˈxɛrbɛrt] ⓘ; 29 October 1924 – 28 July 1998) was a Polish poet, essayist, drama writer and moralist. He is one of the best known and the most translated post-war Polish writers. While he was first published in the 1950s (a volume titled Chord of Light was issued in 1956), soon after he voluntarily ceased submitting most of his works to official Polish government publications. He resumed publication in the 1980s, initially in the underground press. Starting in the 1960s, he was nominated several times for the Nobel Prize in Literature. His books have been translated into 38 languages.
Herbert was one of the main poets of the Polish opposition to communism. Starting in 1986, he lived in Paris, where he cooperated with the journal Zeszyty Literackie. He came back to Poland in 1992. On 1 July 2007 the Polish Government instituted 2008 as the Year of Zbigniew Herbert. In 2013, the Zbigniew Herbert International Literary Award was established in honour of the poet and his literary legacy. He received the 1963 Kościelski Prize (Geneva), 1965 Jurzykowski Prize, 1965 Austrian State Prize for European Literature, 1973 Herder Prize (Austria), 1979 Petrarca-Preis (Germany), and 1991 Jerusalem Prize (Israel).
Zbigniew Herbert was born on 29 October 1924 to Boleslaw Herbert and his wife Maria, née Kaniak. Herbert's Austrian ancestor came to Galicia from Vienna around the turn of the 18th and 19th century. The poet's father was a soldier in the Polish Legions during World War I and a defender of Lwów; he was a lawyer and worked as a bank manager. Herbert's grandmother was Armenian; his grandfather was an English language teacher.
Herbert claimed to be a distant relative of the 17th-century Anglo-Welsh poet George Herbert.
Before the war Zbigniew Herbert attended the Państwowe VIII Gimnazjum i Liceum im. Króla Kazimierza Wielkiego we Lwowie (during the Soviet occupation the name was changed to High School nr 14). After the German and Soviet invasion and subsequent occupation of Lwów, he continued his studies at the secret meetings organized by the Polish underground, where he graduated and passed the school leaving exam (matura) in January 1944. At the same time, (following the Nazi invasion of Poland in 1939) he got involved in conspiratorial action with the AK. During the occupation, he worked as a louse-feeder in the Rudolf Weigl Institute that produced anti-typhus vaccines; he also worked as a salesman in a shop with metal articles. He began Polish philology studies at the secret University of Jan Kazimierz in Lwów but had to break them off as a result of moving to Kraków (spring 1944, before the invasion of the Soviet Red Army in Lwów). Lwów after the war became a Ukrainian Soviet city, no longer within Polish borders. Its previous Polish population had been expelled. The loss of his beloved hometown, and the following feeling of being uprooted, were important motifs in his later works.
At first, he lived in Proszowice, near Kraków (May 1944 – January 1945). Herbert studied economics in Kraków and attended lectures at the Jagiellonian University and at the Academy of Fine Arts. In 1947, after three years of study, he got his Trade Academy diploma. He lived in Sopot (from 1948), where his parents moved in 1946. He worked different jobs; in the Polish National Bank (NBP) in Gdynia (1 March – 30 June 1948), as a sub-editor of the journal Przegląd Kupiecki, and in Gdańsk department of the Polish Writers' Union (ZLP). He met Halina Misiołkowa there (their relationship lasted until 1957). In 1948 he became a member-candidate of the ZLP but resigned in 1951; however, he joined the union again in 1955.
While living in Sopot, he continued his law studies at the Nicolaus Copernicus University in Toruń, where he received a Master of Law. In the same year he was carried on the list on the second year of Philosophy at NCU in Toruń, where he was inter alia a student of his later master, Henryk Elzenberg. In 1949 Herbert moved to Toruń, and worked in the District Museum and in primary school as a teacher.
In Autumn 1951 the poet moved to the University of Warsaw, where he continued studying philosophy for some time. At first, he lived alone in very poor conditions in suburban Warsaw, Brwinów, but then (December 1952 – January 1957), he lived in Warsaw itself on Wiejska Street in a room rented by 12 people. Subsequently, Herbert moved to an official flat on Aleje Jerozolimskie.
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Zbigniew Herbert
Zbigniew Herbert (Polish: [ˈzbiɡɲɛf ˈxɛrbɛrt] ⓘ; 29 October 1924 – 28 July 1998) was a Polish poet, essayist, drama writer and moralist. He is one of the best known and the most translated post-war Polish writers. While he was first published in the 1950s (a volume titled Chord of Light was issued in 1956), soon after he voluntarily ceased submitting most of his works to official Polish government publications. He resumed publication in the 1980s, initially in the underground press. Starting in the 1960s, he was nominated several times for the Nobel Prize in Literature. His books have been translated into 38 languages.
Herbert was one of the main poets of the Polish opposition to communism. Starting in 1986, he lived in Paris, where he cooperated with the journal Zeszyty Literackie. He came back to Poland in 1992. On 1 July 2007 the Polish Government instituted 2008 as the Year of Zbigniew Herbert. In 2013, the Zbigniew Herbert International Literary Award was established in honour of the poet and his literary legacy. He received the 1963 Kościelski Prize (Geneva), 1965 Jurzykowski Prize, 1965 Austrian State Prize for European Literature, 1973 Herder Prize (Austria), 1979 Petrarca-Preis (Germany), and 1991 Jerusalem Prize (Israel).
Zbigniew Herbert was born on 29 October 1924 to Boleslaw Herbert and his wife Maria, née Kaniak. Herbert's Austrian ancestor came to Galicia from Vienna around the turn of the 18th and 19th century. The poet's father was a soldier in the Polish Legions during World War I and a defender of Lwów; he was a lawyer and worked as a bank manager. Herbert's grandmother was Armenian; his grandfather was an English language teacher.
Herbert claimed to be a distant relative of the 17th-century Anglo-Welsh poet George Herbert.
Before the war Zbigniew Herbert attended the Państwowe VIII Gimnazjum i Liceum im. Króla Kazimierza Wielkiego we Lwowie (during the Soviet occupation the name was changed to High School nr 14). After the German and Soviet invasion and subsequent occupation of Lwów, he continued his studies at the secret meetings organized by the Polish underground, where he graduated and passed the school leaving exam (matura) in January 1944. At the same time, (following the Nazi invasion of Poland in 1939) he got involved in conspiratorial action with the AK. During the occupation, he worked as a louse-feeder in the Rudolf Weigl Institute that produced anti-typhus vaccines; he also worked as a salesman in a shop with metal articles. He began Polish philology studies at the secret University of Jan Kazimierz in Lwów but had to break them off as a result of moving to Kraków (spring 1944, before the invasion of the Soviet Red Army in Lwów). Lwów after the war became a Ukrainian Soviet city, no longer within Polish borders. Its previous Polish population had been expelled. The loss of his beloved hometown, and the following feeling of being uprooted, were important motifs in his later works.
At first, he lived in Proszowice, near Kraków (May 1944 – January 1945). Herbert studied economics in Kraków and attended lectures at the Jagiellonian University and at the Academy of Fine Arts. In 1947, after three years of study, he got his Trade Academy diploma. He lived in Sopot (from 1948), where his parents moved in 1946. He worked different jobs; in the Polish National Bank (NBP) in Gdynia (1 March – 30 June 1948), as a sub-editor of the journal Przegląd Kupiecki, and in Gdańsk department of the Polish Writers' Union (ZLP). He met Halina Misiołkowa there (their relationship lasted until 1957). In 1948 he became a member-candidate of the ZLP but resigned in 1951; however, he joined the union again in 1955.
While living in Sopot, he continued his law studies at the Nicolaus Copernicus University in Toruń, where he received a Master of Law. In the same year he was carried on the list on the second year of Philosophy at NCU in Toruń, where he was inter alia a student of his later master, Henryk Elzenberg. In 1949 Herbert moved to Toruń, and worked in the District Museum and in primary school as a teacher.
In Autumn 1951 the poet moved to the University of Warsaw, where he continued studying philosophy for some time. At first, he lived alone in very poor conditions in suburban Warsaw, Brwinów, but then (December 1952 – January 1957), he lived in Warsaw itself on Wiejska Street in a room rented by 12 people. Subsequently, Herbert moved to an official flat on Aleje Jerozolimskie.