Artur Sandauer

Artur Sandauer

Artur Sandauer (born December 14, 1913 in Sambor ( Galicia ), † July 15, 1989 in Warsaw ) was a Polish literary critic, essayist , translator, professor at the University of Warsaw .

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Artur Sandauer studied classical philology at the University of Lemberg . After the annexation of Galicia by the Soviet Union in 1939–1941, he taught in Sambor.

After the invasion of German troops in 1941, he was imprisoned in the Sambor ghetto . In 1943 he managed to escape from the ghetto together with his mother and sister and to find a hiding place.

1944–1945 he was a war correspondent in the Polish People's Army . 1946–1948 he lived in Paris . 1948–1949 he was editor of the Warsaw weekly “Odrodzenie” (rebirth). In 1949 he married the painter Erna Rosenstein (1913–2004).

Artur Sandauer was an opponent of socialist realism and was banned from publication, which was in effect until Stalin's death . It was not until October 1957 in Poland that he published violent criticisms of Socialist Realism. His book "Bez taryfy ulgowej" (Without a reduced tariff) became a reckoning for the years of Stalinism. Since the censorship authorities continued to intervene in his texts, he sent his manuscripts to the Paris exile magazine " Kultura ".

In 1964 he signed the “34” protest letter against censorship.

In 1972 he was appointed Associate Professor of Polish Literature at the University of Warsaw .

Special literary merit

Artur Sandauer contributed a lot to the rediscovery of the writers Witold Gombrowicz and Bruno Schulz, who were forgotten in Poland . His correspondence with Gombrowicz was partially published by Sandauer.

Works (selection)

• Utwory prozatorskie: Śmierć liberała (Death of a Liberal) (1949),
• Poeci trzech pokoleń (Poet of Three Generations) (1955),
• Moje odchylenia (mętniackie, kosmopolityczne, formalistyczne) (My derailments: confusion, cosmopolitanism, formalism) (1956),
• O jedności treści i formy (On the unity of content and form) (1952–1953, published 1957).
• Bez taryfy ulgowej (without reduced tariff) (1959),
• Zapiski z martwego miasta. Autobiography i parabiography (Notes from a Dead City) (1963).
• Dla każdego coś przykrego (Something Embarrassing for Everyone) (1966).
• Samobójstwo Mitrydatesa (Mithridates Suicide) (1968),
• Liryka i logika (Poetry and Logic) (1969),
• Matecznik literacki (Literary Primeval Forest) (1972),
• Studia biblijne Bóg, Szatan, Mesjasz i ...? (Bible Study: God, Satan, Messiah, and ...?) (1977).
• Zebrane pisma krytyczne (Collected Critical Writings) (tom 1-3, 1981),
• O sytuacji pisarza polskiego pochodzenia żydowskiego w XX wieku (On the situation of a Polish writer of Jewish descent in the 20th century) (1982),
• Pisma zebrane (Collected Writings) (tom 1-4, 1985).
• Autobiografia Byłem ... (Autobiography: I was ...) (published 1991).

Translations

• 1. Book of Moses
• Johann Wolfgang von Goethe Faust. A tragedy. 1st chapter
• Aristophanes The clouds , the frogs , the birds
• Aeschylus Agamemnon
• Sophocles King Oedipus
• Euripides Elektra
• Theokritus idyll
• Rainer Maria Rilke poetry
• Wladimir Wladimirowitsch Mayakowski Well and beautiful, the sweat bath
• Anton Chekhov Three sisters , Uncle Vanya , Ivanov
• Anthology of Russian poets

Web links

• Śmierć liberała - Sandauer: Death of a Liberal
• "O sytuacji pisarza polskiego pochodzenia żydowskiego w XX wieku" - Sandauer: On the situation of a Polish writer of Jewish descent in the 20th century
• Perlentaucher.de
• Death of a liberal