The British newspaper website named its selection of the five best Polish books translated into English. The list was made according to the available readings for their unique sense of humanity and sense of humour. 

The list was opened with the famous Treatise on Shelling Beans by Wiesław Myśliwski which is a deep summary of man’s life told to an unknown stranger. The book received the prestigious Polish Nike award in 2007. 

Another one was The Elephant by Sławomir Mrożek, a short story about human imagination and the meaning of truth in public life depicted in Mrożek’s usual form of absurdity. 

The third position was Olga Tokarczuk’s Books of Jacob, a majestic work of the Polish Nobel Prize recipient for literature in 2018. The book tells the forgotten stories of many nationalities living in the area of today’s Central and Eastern Europe, which back then was the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth or Rzeczpospolita Obojga Narodów. 

The Emperor by Ryszard Kapuściński is among the best Polish pieces of reportage. Its main subject is the imperial court of the Ethiopian monarch Haile Selassie I during the constitutional monarchy and after its collapse.

The list ends with another work of Polish literature Nobel Prize winner, Wisława Szymborska and her View with a Grain of Sand: Selected Poems

The full list: 

A Treatise on Shelling Beans by Wiesław Myśliwski, trans. Bill Johnston

The Elephant by Sławomir Mrożek, trans. Konrad Syrop

The Books of Jacob by Olga Tokarczuk, trans. Jennifer Croft

The Emperor by Ryszard Kapuściński, trans. William Brand and Katarzyna Mroczkowska-Brand

View with a Grain of Sand: Selected Poems by Wisława Szymborska, trans. Stanisław Barańczak and Clare Cavanagh

Source: The Guardian

Photo: The Polish Pavillon at the London Book Fair 2024

Tomasz Modrzejewski