Malayala Manorama in association with Polish Institute, New Delhi hosted two of the leading Polish writers Mr. Marek Bieńczyk and Ms. Dorota Masłowska at Manorama Hortus, a festival of art & literature in Kozhikode, Kerala from the 1st to the 3rd of November 2024. 

The newly launched Art Literature Festival Hortus apart from the 150 sessions on art, literature, society, film, music, and current affairs had musical nights, creative writing workshops for kids and adults, film screenings, and theatre and poetry performances. 

Both writers conversed with Tatiana Szurlej, Assistant Visiting Professor of Polish language at Delhi University. The session with Mr. Bieńczyk took place on 2nd Nov at 4 pm and Ms. Masłowska’s session was on 3rd Nov at 4 pm at Venue 2 of Manorama Hortus, Kozhikode Beach. 

Mr. Marek Bieńczyk’s session, “Cutting Across Genres and Forms: The Literary Multiverse of Marek Bieńczyk,” started with the screening of the film “Prince in a Pastry Shop”, based on his short story.

Marek Bieńczyk, whose body of work ranges from novels to literary history to translations, resonated with the Kerala bibliophiles because of his affinity for Milan Kundera as a translator. 

He talked about the movie’s theme, happiness, and why we frequently feel embarrassed to be joyful post the screening. He discussed the melancholy in Polish, which is evident in the author’s writing. The subject of whether being a scholar makes it easier to become a writer or if having a deep understanding of literature makes it harder to write was also addressed by Mr. Bieńczyk. He also discussed translations, both the author’s own and those of his prose, to address the issue of how the style of the translated authors affected his writing. Marek Bieńczyk addressed several audience questions, including suggestions for aspiring authors.

Dorota Masłowska’s body of work which reflects the contemporary urban life of Poland was a revelation for the Kerala readers who are known for their flair for international literature. The theatre-loving city audience heard more about her accomplished play “A couple of poor Polish Speaking Romanians”.

During her panel discussion entitled “Provoking Perspectives: Dorota Masłowska in conversation with Tatiana Szurlej”, she spoke about the right moment to start writing. She elaborated on the various writing stereotypes and the challenges faced by young women seeking fame in a world dominated by men. She addressed her favourite characters from her work and their intriguing motivations. In a conversation with panel moderator Dr. Tatiana Szurlej, she talked about the difficulties she faces as a female writer, the language of the public, and how to integrate it into a literary voice. They also discussed her fantastic essays and musical endeavors. 

About the authors and the animation:

Dorota Masłowska, Born 1983, a writer, playwright, artist. The Author of bestselling debut novel (published in English as) „Snow White and Russian Red”, firstly published in Polish in 2002,  which brought her a plethora of literary nominations and prizes. The novel had been adapted into a feature movie directed by Xawery Żuławski in 2009.
In 2006, her rap-poem  „Queen’s Peacock” won the most important literary award in Poland – NIKE.

She is the playwright of „A couple of poor, Polish Speaking Romanians” and „No Matter how Hard we Try” – scenic plays that have been and still are staged worldwide, in plenty original productions as well as in translations. 
In 2014, as „Mister D” she launched a music album featuring her original lyrics and  music compositions. Another album „Butterflies” was published in 2023.

In 2018 a rhymed novel „Other people” had its premiere and in March 2021 Warner Bros started cinematic  distribution of a feature movie based on the novel, directed by Aleksandra Terpińska, now available in streaming by Canal + Poland. In 2022, yet another play – „Bowie in Warsaw” was published in a book form and premiered on stage at Teatr Studio in Warsaw at the same time.
This August (2024) she has come back with a new novel „Magical Wound”, published by Karakter, Cracow.
All works by Dorota Masłowska have been translated and published in multiple languages, including English, French, German.

Marek Bieńczyk, prose writer, essayist, literary historian, translator from French (Kundera, Cioran, Barthes, Proust). He is a Romance philologist by education, and for two years he also studied Indology at the University of Warsaw. Author of several books, including novels, essay collections, and works that he places between novels and essays. He has also published two books for children (and adult children). His best-known novel “Tworki” (published under the same title in English, North Western University) is set in a psychiatric hospital near Warsaw during World War II. One of the leading themes of his essays is melancholy as a topos of culture. He devoted separate books to the topoi of transparency (published in English as “Transparency”, Dalkey Archive Press) in politics, art and literature, and of catastrophe in the 19th century. In addition to essays on literature, he also writes about art, sports, wine (to which he devoted three volumes of “Wine Chronicles”), geopoetics, and many other topics. He has won several prestigious awards in Poland, including the Nike Award (2012) and the Tuwim Award (2023). For his novel “Tworki,” he received the main award at the Litterature du Monde Festival in Bordeaux. He was decorated by the French government with the Chevalier des Arts et des Lettres distinction, and by the French Academy – the Prix Vermeil de la Francophonie. For four years, he was a board member of the Polish PENClub. His books and texts have been translated into English, French, Spanish, German, Hungarian, Persian, Korean, and several Slavic languages.

PRINCE IN A PASTRY SHOP 

Poland/2020/animated16′
Directed by Katarzyna Agopsowicz
Script: Marek Bieńczyk, Katarzyna Agopsowicz

“Prince in a Pastry Shop” is a seemingly humorous story about happiness. Because “with happiness there are only troubles,” says the Not-So-Little Prince, and he multiplies the examples of these troubles. His interlocutor is Kaktusica, the embodiment of carefree, light-heartedness, simple joy of life, but at the same time a lively, intelligent mind that can make the Prince take a back step in his conversation. This philosophical parable about a couple eating cakes in a cafe touches upon fundamental issues that are close to everyone – the elusiveness of happiness, the fact that we are not always able to perceive it, let alone experience it as fully as possible.