Using the diary of Polish-Jewish teenager Renia Spiegel as inspiration, artist and author Edmund de Waal explores the ability of personal stories to tell difficult truths, joined by translators Marta Dziurosz and Anna Blasiak, and chaired by writer Lisa Appignanesi.<\/p>\n
Renia Spiegel<\/b>\u00a0was born in eastern Poland in 1924. In January 1939 she began to write a diary. When war broke out she and her sister were living with her grandparents. Separated from her mother by the war, the next few years saw her living under first Soviet, then Nazi occupation, and the creation of the ghetto. In the summer of 1942, Renia was forced into hiding to escape the liquidation of the ghetto. A few days later, her hiding place was discovered and she was shot; she was just eighteen.\u00a0 Her dream was to become a poet.\u00a0 Renia\u2019s secret diary was discovered after seventy years and has recently been published.<\/p>\n
Lisa\u00a0 Appignanesi<\/b>\u00a0OBE is a prize-winning writer, novelist, editor, cultural commentator, broadcaster, translator and Chair of the Royal Society of Literature. Her prize winning non-fiction includes\u00a0Everyday Madness,\u00a0<\/i>Trials of Passion: Crimes in the Name of Love and Madness, All About Love: Anatomy of an Unruly Emotion, Mad Bad and Sad: A History of Women and the Mind Doctors from 1800; Freud\u2019s Women<\/i>\u00a0(with John Forrester); a biographical portrait of\u00a0Simone de Beauvoir\u00a0<\/i>and\u00a0The Cabaret.\u00a0<\/i>She is also the author of an acclaimed family memoir,\u00a0Losing the Dead\u00a0<\/i>and nine novels, including\u00a0The Memory Man (<\/i>which won a Holocaust Fiction Prize)\u00a0<\/i>and\u00a0Paris Requiem.\u00a0<\/i>Her books have been translated into several languages, including French, German, Italian, Polish and Turkish.<\/p>\n
Anna Blasiak<\/b>\u00a0is a poet, translator and literature co-ordinator of the European Literature Network. She has translated over 40 books from English into Polish and some fiction and poetry from Polish into English. In addition to her book-length translations, her work has been published in\u00a0Best European Fiction 2015<\/i>,\u00a0Asymptote<\/i>,\u00a0The Guardian<\/i>,\u00a0B O D Y Literature<\/i>,\u00a0Modern Poetry in Translation<\/i>\u00a0and\u00a0York Literary Review<\/i>. Anna writes poetry in Polish and in English (Off<\/i>_Press<\/i>,\u00a0Women<\/i>\u00a0Online<\/i>\u00a0Writing,<\/i>\u00a0Exiled<\/i>\u00a0Ink, The Blue Nib, Ink Sweat and Tears, The Queer Riveter\u00a0<\/i>and\u00a0Modern Poetry in Translation)<\/i>. She has worked in museums and a radio station, run magazines, written on art, film and theatre.<\/p>\n
Marta Dziurosz<\/b>\u00a0is a Polish literary translator and interpreter, and a literary curator. She was Free Word Centre’s Translator in Residence (2015-16), is a member of the Translators Association committee and works at the publishing house Pan Macmillan. Her translations and other writing have been published in print and online by Penguin Random House, Vallentine Mitchell, Asymptote, The New Statesman, Words Without Borders and The Linguist, among others. She is a finalist of the 2019 Jasmine Awards.<\/p>\n
Edmund de Waal<\/b>\u00a0is an artist who writes. Much of his work is around the contingency of memory: bringing particular histories of loss and exile into renewed life. He continually investigates themes of diaspora, memorial, materiality and the colour white with his interventions and artworks made for diverse spaces and museums worldwide. Edmund is also renowned for his bestselling memoir,\u00a0The Hare with Amber Eyes<\/i>\u00a0(2010), which won many literary prizes including the RSL Ondaatje Prize and the Costa Biography Award and has been translated into over 30 languages.<\/p>\n
In partnership with The Polish Cultural Institute in London.<\/p>\n