The Long Night of LiteratureS, an evening with renowned authors from 13 European countries took place at the Instituto Cervantes on 22nd September 2023 in New Delhi.
Poland was represented by one of the its best-selling crime novelist Zygmunt Miłoszewski. Polish Institute together with Ukrainian Embassy invited Polish – Ukrainian writer Ms. Żanna Słoniowska.
The format of the event encouraged audiences to listen to many authors through the course of the evening. Each author read to an audience of about 20 people for 20 minutes. The audience then rotated to different rooms and new authors, allowing an intimate space for audience-author interactions.
Video by : Pulkit Kalra
Prior to the literary evening, Zygmunt Miłoszewski and Żanna Słoniowska attended the Long Night of Literature’s “Speaking Past Borders: German, French, Polish, and Ukrainian Writers in Conversation” event which was organized at the Jawaharlal Nehru University, Delhi on 21st September 2023. At the event, authors made introductions and engaged the audience in a discussion about how to start a publishing, challenges associated with translating literature, relationships between writers and translators, and writing internationally.
From Delhi authors travelled to Kolkata for the Long Night LiteratureS held at Goethe-Institut Kolkata and Alliance Française du Bengale Kolkata on 25th September.
Photo Credit: Manoj Kar, Addiction :
About the authors:
Zygmunt Miłoszewski (b. 1976) is a top-selling Polish novelist, journalist, and scriptwriter. He achieved international success with his crime trilogy starring Prosecutor Szacki, and his work has been adapted for cinema and television.
His first novel, a horror story called The Intercom, was published in 2005 to high acclaim. In 2006, his novel for teenagers, The Adder Mountains, appeared. Major success came in 2007 with the publication of Entanglement, the first in the trilogy of crime novels that have gained him a popular following in Poland and abroad. In 2010 Entanglement was published in English by Bitter Lemon Press, and in 2011, a Polish movie based on the novel was released with the same title. In the same year, a sequel called A Grain of Truth was published, became an instant bestseller and earned Miłoszewski a place on the shortlist (of three) for the prestigious “Passport Polityka” award given annually to writers under the age of 40. In 2012 it too was published in English translation by Bitter Lemon Press, and in 2015 the Polish movie version was released, with a screenplay co-authored by Miłoszewski and director Borys Lankosz. Meanwhile, in 2014, Rage, the third and final part of the trilogy featuring Prosecutor Szacki as the main protagonist, had won him the “Passport Polityka”. Rage was published in English by AmazonCrossing in 2016.
All three of these crime novels have appeared in more than 40 editions in 18 languages. In Poland alone they have jointly sold over a million copies. Outside Poland, Miłoszewski’s greatest success has been in France and the author has won or been shortlisted for numerous literary prizes including the “Prix du Polar Européen”, awarded to the best European crime novel. All three novels have been adapted for radio dramatization and broadcast by BBC Radio 4 in the UK.
Between crime novels, in 2013 Miłoszewski wrote Priceless, a fast-paced art heist thriller that won several awards and has so far been published in six foreign languages. In 2017 it was published in French translation (winning the Transfuge prize), and in 2018 in English, by AmazonCrossing. It is now being adapted for the screen by Netflix. His next novel, a romantic “what if?” story, Will You Still Love Me Yesterday? (2018) won three “Book of the Year” awards.
Miłoszewski is also a screen writer. As well as co-authoring the screenplay for A Grain of Truth, he co-authored a Polish television series called The Prosecutor.
Żanna Słoniowska (born in Lviv) is a Ukrainian-born Polish novelist.
She is a winner of Znak literary prize for her novel Dom z witrażem (The house with the stained-glass window) in 2015 and Conrad prize for the best Polish literary debut of 2016. The novel was also short-listed for the Nike award in 2016.
“The House with the Stained-Glass Window is remarkable, a gripping, Lvivian evocation of a city and a family across a long and painful century, at once personal and political, a novel of life and survival across the ages” Philippe Sands, author of East West street.
The novel has been translated into 8 languages so far: Ukrainian, English, Russian, French, German, Spanish. Italian and Serbian translations are work in progress.
Żanna Słoniowska has been invited to present her book to the European First Novel Festival (Budapest, Hungary), European Festival of the First Novel (Kiel, Germany), British library (London, UK), Oxford Comparative Criticism and Translation’s seminar, Trinity college (Dublin, Ireland), Maison de la poesie (Paris, France), Bron festival (Lyon, France), Zurich liest, Leipzig Book Fair and many other conferences and book events throughout Europe.
In May 2019 Sloniowska was the part of the Franshhoek Literary Festival in South Africa.
Żanna Słoniowska held a scholarship in Visehrad Fund (Autumn 2016), Literarische Coloquuium Berlin (May 2017), was a guest in Baltic Centre for Writers and Translators in Visby (August 2017), International Writers’ and Translators’ Centre in Rhodes (January 2019), Hugoenea in Pasaia, Basque country, Spain (November 2019).
In December, 2017 the group of French journalists came to the city of Lviv to have a walking tour on the footsteps of the characters of The house with the stained-glass window.
In November, 2018 The house with the stained-glass window was shortlisted as the best foreign novel translated into English at Warwick university, UK.
The reviews about The house with the stained-glass window were published in Gazeta Wyborcza, Polityka, Financial Times, Times Literary Supplement, Le Figaro, 1 RFI, Spiegel online, Cape Times, El Pais, to mention some of them.
In May 2019 the second novel of Sloniowska, The Island, was published in Poland by Znak.
2020: wrote a play The Oscilations for Wrocławski Teatr Współczesny (Contemporary Theatre in Wrocław).
In 2020 The Island was published in Ukraine by The Old Lion
2022: The launch of the book for the teenagers Discovering Ukraine for Dwie Siostry (Two Sisters Publishing House, Poland).
In October 2022 the Spanish translation of her first novel came out in Alianza (Madrid) under the title Una vidriera en Leopolis. The launch of the book met a huge interest of the Spanish press with dozens of interviews published at El Pais, La Vanguardia, Radio Nacional (El ojo critico) and many others.
2023: Wertepy, her third novel will come out in Znak Publishing House, Poland.
Żanna Sloniowska works as the translator (Polish-Ukrainian-Russian) for many cultural institutions in Poland, e.g. International Cultural Centre, Teatr Stary, The Institute of Literature and many more.
