Antoni Edward Odyniec (25 January 1804 – 15 January 1885) was a Polish Romantic-era poet who penned the celebrated "Song of the

Filarete Antonio di Pietro Aver(u)lino (; – ), known as Filarete (; from , meaning "lover of excellence"), was a Florentine Renaissance architect, sculptor, medallist, and architectural theorist. He is perhaps best remembered for his design of the ide ...

s". Said to be an imitator of his friend

Adam Mickiewicz Adam Bernard Mickiewicz (24 December 179826 November 1855) was a Polish poet, dramatist, essayist, publicist, translator and political activist. He is regarded as national poet in Poland, Lithuania and Belarus. He also largely influenced Ukra ...

, Odyniec made his mark as a

translator Translation is the communication of the meaning of a source-language text by means of an equivalent target-language text. The English language draws a terminological distinction (which does not exist in every language) between ''trans ...

of works by writers, including

Walter Scott Sir Walter Scott, 1st Baronet (15 August 1771 – 21 September 1832), was a Scottish novelist, poet and historian. Many of his works remain classics of European literature, European and Scottish literature, notably the novels ''Ivanhoe'' (18 ...

Byron George Gordon Byron, 6th Baron Byron (22 January 1788 – 19 April 1824) was an English poet. He is one of the major figures of the Romantic movement, and is regarded as being among the greatest poets of the United Kingdom. Among his best-kno ...

Friedrich Schiller Johann Christoph Friedrich von Schiller (, short: ; 10 November 17599 May 1805) was a German playwright, poet, philosopher and historian. Schiller is considered by most Germans to be Germany's most important classical playwright. He was born i ...

and Pushkin. He was also an organizer of the literary scene and author of colourful

memoir A memoir (; , ) is any nonfiction narrative writing based on the author's personal memories. The assertions made in the work are thus understood to be factual. While memoir has historically been defined as a subcategory of biography or autob ...

s that described the

private lives ''Private Lives'' is a 1930 comedy of manners in three acts by Noël Coward. It concerns a divorced couple who, while honeymooning with their new spouses, discover that they are staying in adjacent rooms at the same hotel. Despite a perpetuall ...

of writers, especially Mickiewicz.

Life

Odyniec was born in Giejstuny, Oszmiana County, now in

Belarus Belarus, officially the Republic of Belarus, is a landlocked country in Eastern Europe. It is bordered by Russia to the east and northeast, Ukraine to the south, Poland to the west, and Lithuania and Latvia to the northwest. Belarus spans an a ...

, in 1804. Odyniec was an alumnus of Wilno University, where he was a member of the Filaret Association and a defendant, along with Mickiewicz and others, in the 1824 trial of Association members. In 1825 he published his first collection of short works and lived in Warsaw. In 1829–30 he accompanied his fellow poet and ex-''Filaret''

on a tour of Germany, Italy and Switzerland, recounted in somewhat embroidered ''Listy z podróży'' (Travel Letters). In 1831 Odyniec settled in

Dresden Dresden (; ; Upper Saxon German, Upper Saxon: ''Dräsdn''; , ) is the capital city of the States of Germany, German state of Saxony and its second most populous city after Leipzig. It is the List of cities in Germany by population, 12th most p ...

, in

Saxony Saxony, officially the Free State of Saxony, is a landlocked state of Germany, bordering the states of Brandenburg, Saxony-Anhalt, Thuringia, and Bavaria, as well as the countries of Poland and the Czech Republic. Its capital is Dresden, and ...

, where he translated works by

and

Thomas Moore Thomas Moore (28 May 1779 – 25 February 1852), was an Irish writer, poet, and lyricist who was widely regarded as Ireland's "National poet, national bard" during the late Georgian era. The acclaim rested primarily on the popularity of his ''I ...

. He also co-edited a "Library of Polish Classics," and wrote for ''Przyjaciel Ludu'' (The Friend of the People), published in

Leszno Leszno (, , ) is a historic city in western Poland, seat of Leszno County within the Greater Poland Voivodeship. It is the seventh-largest city in the province with an estimated population of 62,200, as of 2021. Leszno is a former residential cit ...

. In 1837 he returned to Wilno (Vilnius), where he edited Gluksberg's ''Encyklopedia Powszechna'' (Universal Encyclopedia) and, in 1840–63, ''Kurier Wileński'' (The Wilno Courier). In 1866 Odyniec returned to Warsaw, where he edited ''Kurier Warszawski'' (The Warsaw Courier) and published in ''Kronika Rodzinna'' (The Family Chronicle) his ''Travel Letters'' and ''Remembrances of the Past, As Told to Deotyma''. He died in Warsaw in 1885. He penned ballads, songs and legends, published in ''Poezje'' (Poems, 2 vols., 1825–26); dramatic works, including '' Barbara Radziwiłłówna'' (1858); translations of works by

Gottfried August Bürger Gottfried August Bürger (31 December 1747 – 8 June 1794) was a German poet. His ballads were very popular in Germany. His most noted ballad, ''Lenore (ballad), Lenore'', found an audience beyond readers of the German language in an English l ...

(3 vols., 1838–44); and ''Wspomnienia z przeszłości opowiadane Deotymie'' (Remembrances of the Past, As Told to Deotyma, 1884).PWN.

Notes

References

*"Odyniec, Antoni Edward," ''

Encyklopedia Polski This is a list of encyclopedias by language. Albanian Encyclopedias written in Albanian. * '' Albanian Encyclopedic Dictionary'' (): published by Academy of Sciences of Albania; ** First Edition (1985; ''FESH'') ** New Edition (2008/09; ''Botim ...

'', , pp. 456–57. *"Odyniec, Antoni Edward," ''Encyklopedia powszechna PWN'' (

PWN Leet (or "1337"), also known as eleet or leetspeak, or simply hacker speech, is a system of modified spellings used primarily on the Internet. It often uses character replacements in ways that play on the similarity of their glyphs via refle ...

Universal Encyclopedia), vol. 3, Warsaw,

Państwowe Wydawnictwo Naukowe Wydawnictwo Naukowe PWN (''Polish Scientific Publishers PWN''; until 1991 ''Państwowe Wydawnictwo Naukowe'' - ''National Scientific Publishers PWN'', PWN) is a Polish book publisher, founded in 1951, when it split from the Wydawnictwa Szkolne i ...

, 1975, p. 349. *Jan Zygmunt Jakubowski, ed., ''Literatura polska od średniowiecza do pozytywizmu'' (Polish Literature from the Middle Ages to Positivism), Warsaw,

, 1979, . {{DEFAULTSORT:Odyniec, Antoni Edward 1804 births 1885 deaths Polish memoirists Translators from English English–Polish translators German–Polish translators Russian–Polish translators Vilnius University alumni 19th-century Polish translators 19th-century Polish poets Polish male poets 19th-century Polish male writers 19th-century memoirists

Life

See also

Notes

References