Stefan Żeromski ( ; 14 October 1864 – 20 November 1925) was a Polish

novelist A novelist is an author or writer of novels, though often novelists also write in other genres of both fiction and non-fiction. Some novelists are professional novelists, thus make a living writing novels and other fiction, while others aspire ...

and

dramatist A playwright or dramatist is a person who writes plays. Etymology The word "play" is from Middle English pleye, from Old English plæġ, pleġa, plæġa ("play, exercise; sport, game; drama, applause"). The word "wright" is an archaic English ...

belonging to the Young Poland movement at the turn of the 20th century. He was called the "conscience of Polish literature". He also wrote under the

pen name A pen name, also called a ''nom de plume'' or a literary double, is a pseudonym (or, in some cases, a variant form of a real name) adopted by an author and printed on the title page or by-line of their works in place of their real name. A pen na ...

s Maurycy Zych, Józef Katerla, and Stefan Iksmoreż. He was nominated four times for the

Nobel Prize in Literature ) , image = Nobel Prize.png , caption = , awarded_for = Outstanding contributions in literature , presenter = Swedish Academy , holder = Annie Ernaux (2022) , location = Stockholm, Sweden , year = 1901 , ...

Life

Stefan Żeromski was born on 14 October 1864 at Strawczyn, near

Kielce Kielce (, yi, קעלץ, Keltz) is a city in southern Poland, and the capital of the Świętokrzyskie Voivodeship. In 2021, it had 192,468 inhabitants. The city is in the middle of the Świętokrzyskie Mountains (Holy Cross Mountains), on the ban ...

. On 2 September 1892, he married a widow, Oktawia Rodkiewiczowa, ''née'' Radziwiłłowiczówna, whom he had met at a spa in Nałęczów, co-owned by her stepfather. One of the witnesses at the wedding was the novelist Bolesław Prus, an admirer of Oktawia's who had not been in favor of the marriage. The newlyweds moved to Switzerland, where Żeromski worked from 1892 to 1896 as a

librarian A librarian is a person who works professionally in a library providing access to information, and sometimes social or technical programming, or instruction on information literacy to users. The role of the librarian has changed much over time ...

at the Polish National Museum in

Rapperswil Rapperswil (Swiss German: or ;Andres Kristol, ''Rapperswil SG (See)'' in: ''Dictionnaire toponymique des communes suisses – Lexikon der schweizerischen Gemeindenamen – Dizionario toponomastico dei comuni svizzeri (DTS, LSG)'', Centre de dial ...

. At Oktawia's request Prus, though no admirer of Żeromski's writings, helped the struggling couple as much as he could. In 1913 Żeromski started a new family with the painter Anna Zawadzka, whom he had met in 1908; they had a daughter, Monika. In 1924, in recognition of Żeromski's achievements, President Stanisław Wojciechowski gave him a three-room apartment on the second floor of

Warsaw Warsaw ( pl, Warszawa, ), officially the Capital City of Warsaw,, abbreviation: ''m.st. Warszawa'' is the capital and largest city of Poland. The metropolis stands on the River Vistula in east-central Poland, and its population is officiall ...

's Royal Castle. In the same year, Żeromski was shortlisted for the

Nobel Prize The Nobel Prizes ( ; sv, Nobelpriset ; no, Nobelprisen ) are five separate prizes that, according to Alfred Nobel's will of 1895, are awarded to "those who, during the preceding year, have conferred the greatest benefit to humankind." Alfr ...

in literature.Polish culture: The Stefan Żeromski Museum
at www.culture.pl He died on 20 November 1925 in

Selected works

* Twilight (''Zmierzch'', short story, 1892) * Ravens and Crows Will Peck Us to Pieces (''Rozdziobią nas kruki, wrony'', 1895) * Doctor Peter (''Doktor Piotr'', 1895) * The Labors of Sisyphus (''Syzyfowe prace'', 1898), about 19th- and 20th-century

Tsar Tsar ( or ), also spelled ''czar'', ''tzar'', or ''csar'', is a title used by East and South Slavic monarchs. The term is derived from the Latin word ''caesar'', which was intended to mean "emperor" in the European medieval sense of the ter ...

ist efforts to

russify Russification (russian: русификация, rusifikatsiya), or Russianization, is a form of cultural assimilation in which non-Russians, whether involuntarily or voluntarily, give up their culture and language in favor of the Russian cultur ...

the Russian-occupied part of Poland) * Homeless People (''Ludzie bezdomni'', 1899) * Ashes (', 1904) * Forest Echoes (''Echa leśne'', 1905) * The Wages of Sin (''Dzieje grzechu'', 1908) * Elegy for a Hetman (''Duma o hetmanie'', 1908) * The Rose (''Róża'', 1909) * ''

Sułkowski Sułkowski (feminine: Sułkowska) is a Polish-language surname associated with the Polish noble Sułkowski family. Russified version: Sulkovsky. Notable people with this surname include: *Alexander Joseph Sulkowski (1695–1762), a Saxon-Polish g ...

'' (1910) * The Faithful River (''Wierna rzeka'', 1912) * The Charm of Life (''Uroda życia'', 1912) * Struggles with Satan (''Walka z szatanem'', vols. 1-2, 1916; vol. 3, 1919) * Wind from the Sea (''Wiatr od morza'', 1922) * My Quail Has Fled (''Uciekła mi przepióreczka'', 1924) * Seedtime (''Przedwiośnie'', 1924) * Journals (''Dzienniki'', published posthumously, 1953-1956) Żeromski's works have been translated into several languages. They have been translated into Croatian by a member of the Croatian

Academy An academy (Attic Greek: Ἀκαδήμεια; Koine Greek Ἀκαδημία) is an institution of secondary or tertiary higher learning (and generally also research or honorary membership). The name traces back to Plato's school of philosop ...

Stjepan Musulin Stjepan Musulin (1885 in Sremska Mitrovica – 1969) was a Croatian linguist, comparative Slavicist, philologist, lexicographer and translator. Life Musulin translated from the Polish and Czech languages. He is recognized as one of the gre ...

Films

Several of Żeromski's novels have been filmed, by Walerian Borowczyk (''Dzieje grzechu'', " A Story of Sin"),

Andrzej Wajda Andrzej Witold Wajda (; 6 March 1926 – 9 October 2016) was a Polish film and theatre director. Recipient of an Honorary Oscar, the Palme d'Or, as well as Honorary Golden Lion and Honorary Golden Bear Awards, he was a prominent member of the ...

(''Popioły'', "

Ashes Ashes may refer to: * Ash, the solid remnants of fires. Media and entertainment Art * ''Ashes'' (Munch), an 1894 painting by Edvard Munch Film * ''The Ashes'' (film), a 1965 Polish film by director Andrzej Wajda * ''Ashes'' (1922 film), ...

"), and

Filip Bajon Filip Michał Bajon (born 25 August 1947) is a Polish Polish may refer to: * Anything from or related to Poland, a country in Europe * Polish language * Poles, people from Poland or of Polish descent * Polish chicken *Polish brothers (Mark P ...

(''Przedwiośnie'', "

The Spring to Come The Polish novel ''Przedwiośnie'' (a title translated alternatively as ''First Spring'',

").

Notes

References

* Irena Kwiatkowska-Siemieńska, ''Stefan Żeromski. La nature dans son expériences et sa pensée'' (Stefan Żeromski: Nature in His Experiences and Thought), ''Préface de Jean Fabre, Professeur à la Sorbonne'' (Preface by Jean Fabre, Professor at the Sorbonne), Paris, Nizet, 1964 (256 pp.). * Mortkowicz-Olczakowa, Hanna (1961). ''Bunt wspomnień.'' Państwowy Instytut Wydawniczy.

External links