“The Peasants”, or “Chłopi” in Polish, is one of Poland’s most engrossing twentieth-century epics, by the 1924 winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature, Władysław Reymont.

It is now available in English translation by Anna Zaranko, the first English tranalation since 1924.

Synopsis:

In the village of Lipce, scandal, romance and drama crackle in every hearth. Boryna, a widower and the village’s wealthiest farmer, has taken the young and beautiful Jagusia as his bride – but she only has eyes for his impetuous son Antek.

Over the course of four seasons – Autumn to Summer – the tangled skein of their story unravels, watched eagerly by the other peasants: the gossip Jagustynka, pious Roch, hot-blooded Mateusz, gentle Witek … Richly lyrical and thrillingly realist, at turns comic, tragic and reflective, Wladyslaw Reymont’s magnum opus is a love song to a lasting dream of rural Poland, and to the eternal, timeless matters of the heart.

Wladyslaw Stanislaw Reymont (7 May 1867 – 5 December 1925) was a Polish novelist and the 1924 laureate of the Nobel Prize in Literature. He is best known for his four-volume epic The Peasants (Chlopi), which was original published between 1904 and 1909.

Find out more about Waldyslaw Reymont’s “The Peasants” here:

The Peasants – Władysław Reymont | #language & literature | Culture.pl

Anna Zaranko

Find out more about translator Anna Zaranko here: Anna Zaranko | Culture.pl

To find out more about purchase options for the book, see the following link:

The Peasants (penguin.co.uk)

Link to Foyles Bookshop Event on 7 February – Anna Zaranko & Hugh Welchman in conversation

The Peasants – Wladyslaw Reymont; Anna Zaranko; | Foyles Bookstore