Marek Hlasko – författare

Marek Hlasko's literary autobiography is a vivid, first-hand account of the life of a young writer in 1950s Poland and a fascinating portrait of the ultimately short-lived rebel generation. Told in a voice suffused with grit and morbid humor, Hlasko's memoir was a classic of its time. In it he recounts his adventures and misadventures, moving swiftly from one tale to the next. Like many writers of his time, Hlasko also worked in screen writing, and his memoir provides a glimpse into just how markedly the medium of film affected him from his very earliest writing days.The memoir details his relationships with such giants of Polish culture as the filmmaker Roman Polanski and the novelist Jerzy Andrzejewski. Hlasko is the most prominent example of a writer who broke free from the Socialist-Realist formulae that dominated the literary scene in Poland since it fell under the influence of the Soviets. He made his literary debut in 1956 and immediately became a poster boy for Polish Literature. He subsequently worked at some of the most important newspapers and magazines for intellectual life in Warsaw. Hlasko was sent to Paris on an official mission in 1958, but when he published in an \u00e9migr\u00e9 Parisian press his novel of life in post-War Poland, he was denied a renewal of his passport. In effect, he was called back to Poland, and when he refused to return he was stripped of his Polish citizenship. He spent the rest of his life working in exile.Marek Hlasko was a rebel whose writing and iconoclastic way of life became an inspiration to those of his generation and after. Here, in the first English translation of his literary memoir, Ross Ufberg deftly renders Hlasko's wry and passionate voice.

“An existential fable” from the uncompromising Polish author of Killing the Second Dog, known as the James Dean of Eastern Europe (The New York Times).   In this novel of breathtaking tension and sweltering love, two desperate friends on the edge of the law—one of them tough and gutsy, the other small and scared—travel to the southern Israeli city of Eilat to find work. There, Dov Ben Dov, the handsome native Israeli with a reputation for causing trouble, and Israel, his sidekick, stay with Ben Dov’s recently married younger brother, Little Dov, who has enough trouble of his own. Local toughs are encroaching on Little Dov’s business, and he enlists his older brother to drive them away. It doesn’t help that a beautiful German widow named Ursula is rooming next door. What follows is a story of passion, deception, violence, and betrayal, all conveyed in hardboiled prose reminiscent of Dashiell Hammett and Raymond Chandler, with a cinematic style that would make Humphrey Bogart and Marlon Brando green with envy.   “[A] blowtorch of a novel . . . Matchless and prescient.” —Publishers Weekly   “A story as bleak and unrelenting as its setting, in which no one escapes the past or themselves. Nihilistic but compelling.” —Kirkus Reviews  Praise for Marek Hlasko “Hlasko was an original. His novels were fearless, his vision unsparing, and decades later, his darkly brilliant work has lost none of its power to unsettle. He achieved what few other writers ever have: he turned the literary landscape into a much more interesting place than it was when he found it.” ––Emily St. John Mandel, author of National Book Award finalist Station Eleven

En una base aislada del mundo, rodeados de bosque y de las cumbres de los montes Gigantes, en el sur de Polonia, un grupo de desarraigados trabaja transportando madera en camiones desvencijados. Afligidos por su destino, los hombres no pueden imaginar un futuro; tan solo anhelan unos camiones nuevos con los que hacer su trabajo de forma menos arriesgada, algo que les permita pensar en otra cosa diferente a la muerte. Las carreteras al borde del precipicio, llenas de nieve y baches, intensifican su frustracion y la sensacion de amenaza constante. Cada dia que pasa se hunden mas en la desesperacion, el desencanto y los recuerdos. Un dia un representante del partido llega al barracon de la base maderera. La llegada de este con su esposa a la cerrada comunidad masculina no hace mas que profundizar los conflictos mientras ella intenta desesperadamente escapar de aquel infierno. Publicada por primera vez en 1958, esta novela, calificada de western de la era comunista, continua la linea de critica social y de realismo pesimista de uno de los autores mas rebeldes de la literatura polaca.

Opowiadania sa brama do literackiego uniwersum Marka Hlaski, przekletego pisarza polskiej literatury XX wieku. Surowym, szczerym i gleboko ludzkim glosem Hlasko tworzy w tych opowiadaniach mozaike istnien naznaczonych samotnoscia, buntem i poszukiwaniem godnosci w swiecie, ktory czesto zdaje sie jej odmawiac. Na tych stronach spotykaja sie bohaterowie walczacy z wlasnymi ograniczeniami, kochajacy z dzika intensywnoscia, wspominajacy z bolem lub po prostu probujacy przetrwac otaczajaca ich rzeczywistosc. Kazde opowiadanie odslania mistrzostwo narracyjne Hlaski: jego zdolnosc do bezlitosnej, przenikliwej obserwacji codziennosci i przeksztalcania jej w literature o niezapomnianej sile wyrazu. Siegajac po Opowiadania, czytelnik odkrywa nie tylko zbior poruszajacych i mocnych historii, lecz takze istote autora, ktorego burzliwe zycie i literacka wrazliwosc uczynily postacia wyjatkowa w europejskiej literaturze.