Michał Witkowski

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Jerzy Nasierowski and Michal Witkowski

Michał Witkowski (born January 13, 1975 in Wrocław ) is a Polish writer and journalist . He lives in Warsaw .

life and work

Witkowski's first book Copyright - a collection of short stories - was published in 2001. His next work, Lubiewo , which has also been translated into German and with which he became known nationwide, was published at the end of 2005. Photo wallpaper followed in 2006, another volume with it Short stories, 2007 the novel Barbara Radziwillówna z Jaworzna-Szczakowej (Ger. UdT Queen Barbara ) and 2009 the novel Margot . Since then Witkowski has published two "gay detective novels" in which a gay writer and journalist named Michał Witkowski appears as a first-person narrator and (involuntary) detective: 2011 Drwal (The Woodcutter) and 2014 Zbrodniarz i dziewczyna (The Criminal and the Girl).

The publication of the next novel Fynf und cfancyś was delayed by a scandal triggered by Witkowski's appearance at the Fashion Week in Łódź in April 2015 with a headgear with plastic bunnies, feathers, the words "Baby Girl" and the like. v. a. SS runes could also be seen. As a result, the public prosecutor's office initiated investigations into "propagating fascism", which had since been closed, and the Cracow publishing house Znak suspended its cooperation with Witkowski for an indefinite period. At the beginning of October, Znak announced that the novel about the experiences of two Eastern European prostitutes in Vienna and Zurich, with which Witkowski is returning "to his literary roots and characters from Lubiewo ", would have its premiere on October 21, 2015.

Witkowski was shortlisted for the Polish Nike Literature Prize three times , with Lubiewo (2006, shortlist), Photo Tapeta (2007, longlist) and Drwal (2012, longlist). In 2006 he received the Literature Prize of the City of Gdynia (Gdynia) for Lubiewo and the Paszport Polityki Prize in 2007 for Barbara Radziwillówna z Jaworzna-Szczakowej . Lubiewo was on the longlist of the Independent Foreign Fiction Prize in 2011 under the English title Lovetown .

In addition to his work as a writer, he also works as a journalist and editor of the Polish cultural journal Ha! Art .

Witkowskis considers himself homosexual, but rejects the designation gay / gay because he sees the term as a product of the commercialized mass culture , which gives a narrow and stereotypical, i.e. H. corresponds to a poorly differentiated and hardly reflected relationship to this type of sexual orientation .

Lubiewo and the literary gay spring

Witkowski caused a scandal in the Polish cultural scene with his explicitly gay novel Lubiewo and received severe criticism from the conservative and ecclesiastical classes of Poland. The plot of the book is set in the gay milieu of the former People's Republic of Poland in the 70s and 80s. The writer describes the underground character of the relevant scene from back then and makes use of a vulgar language , with which many scenes are given a promiscuous and "disreputable" color.

Lubiewo is considered to be the first gay novel in modern Polish literature. It was extremely successful in the Polish literary scene, which can be seen from its large circulation figures. The commercial success of the book encouraged a number of publishers to publish a number of new gay novels by Polish authors. Some critics speak of a spring or a boom in this literary genre in Poland. It is noteworthy that the subject of homosexuality and its representation in fiction literature came up during the reign of Jarosław Kaczyński's active anti-gay Polish government .

Works in German

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Did Michał Witkowski propagate fascism? (Polish)
  2. ↑ Michał Witkowski finally publishes "Fynf und cfancyś" (Polish)
personal data
SURNAME Witkowski, Michał
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Polish writer and journalist
DATE OF BIRTH January 13, 1975
PLACE OF BIRTH Wroclaw