Karl Dedecius (20 May 1921 in

Łódź Łódź is a city in central Poland and a former industrial centre. It is the capital of Łódź Voivodeship, and is located south-west of Warsaw. Łódź has a population of 655,279, making it the country's List of cities and towns in Polan ...

– 26 February 2016) was a Polish-born German translator of Polish and

Russian literature Russian literature refers to the literature of Russia, its Russian diaspora, émigrés, and to Russian language, Russian-language literature. Major contributors to Russian literature, as well as English for instance, are authors of different e ...

.Übersetzer Karl Dedecius 94-jährig verstorben

Life

Dedecius was born to

ethnic German Germans (, ) are the natives or inhabitants of Germany, or sometimes more broadly any people who are of German descent or native speakers of the German language. The constitution of Germany, implemented in 1949 following the end of World War ...

parents in the city of

, Poland, then a multicultural and multilingual city, which, though formerly ruled by the

House of Romanov The House of Romanov (also transliterated as Romanoff; , ) was the reigning dynasty, imperial house of Russia from 1613 to 1917. They achieved prominence after Anastasia Romanovna married Ivan the Terrible, the first crowned tsar of all Russi ...

, at that time had only recently become a part of the newly founded

Second Polish Republic The Second Polish Republic, at the time officially known as the Republic of Poland, was a country in Central and Eastern Europe that existed between 7 October 1918 and 6 October 1939. The state was established in the final stage of World War I ...

. Dedecius attended the Polish Stefan-Żeromski High School, where he received his high-school degree (

Matura or its translated terms (''mature'', ''matur'', , , , , ', ) is a Latin name for the secondary school exit exam or "maturity diploma" in various European countries, including Albania, Austria, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Czech ...

). After the German

invasion of Poland The invasion of Poland, also known as the September Campaign, Polish Campaign, and Polish Defensive War of 1939 (1 September – 6 October 1939), was a joint attack on the Second Polish Republic, Republic of Poland by Nazi Germany, the Slovak R ...

in the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

, Dedecius was first conscripted into the Reich Labor Service (

Reichsarbeitsdienst The Reich Labour Service (''Reichsarbeitsdienst''; RAD) was a major paramilitary organization established in Nazi Germany as an agency to help mitigate the effects of unemployment on the Economy of Nazi Germany, German economy, militarise the wo ...

) and then into the

German Army The German Army (, 'army') is the land component of the armed forces of Federal Republic of Germany, Germany. The present-day German Army was founded in 1955 as part of the newly formed West German together with the German Navy, ''Marine'' (G ...

. He was severely wounded in the

Battle of Stalingrad The Battle of Stalingrad ; see . rus, links=on, Сталинградская битва, r=Stalingradskaya bitva, p=stəlʲɪnˈɡratskəjə ˈbʲitvə. (17 July 19422 February 1943) was a major battle on the Eastern Front of World War II, ...

and became a prisoner of war. During his time as a prisoner of war in the

Gulag The Gulag was a system of Labor camp, forced labor camps in the Soviet Union. The word ''Gulag'' originally referred only to the division of the Chronology of Soviet secret police agencies, Soviet secret police that was in charge of runnin ...

system of the

Soviet Union The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...

, he taught himself Russian. Dedecius wrote, "I lay in my sick-bed, and the nurses brought me books by Lermontov, for instance. For one year, I learned the

Cyrillic Alphabet The Cyrillic script ( ) is a writing system used for various languages across Eurasia. It is the designated national script in various Slavic, Turkic, Mongolic, Uralic, Caucasian and Iranic-speaking countries in Southeastern Europe, Easte ...

and Russian by reading Lermontov and

Pushkin Alexander Sergeyevich Pushkin () was a Russian poet, playwright, and novelist of the Romantic era.Basker, Michael. Pushkin and Romanticism. In Ferber, Michael, ed., ''A Companion to European Romanticism''. Oxford: Blackwell, 2005. He is conside ...

. Eventually, the guards asked me to write love-letters for them, because I wrote like Pushkin." Dedecius was finally released from Soviet captivity in 1950. He settled first with his fiancé in

Weimar Weimar is a city in the state (Germany), German state of Thuringia, in Central Germany (cultural area), Central Germany between Erfurt to the west and Jena to the east, southwest of Leipzig, north of Nuremberg and west of Dresden. Together w ...

, in

East Germany East Germany, officially known as the German Democratic Republic (GDR), was a country in Central Europe from Foundation of East Germany, its formation on 7 October 1949 until German reunification, its reunification with West Germany (FRG) on ...

. In 1952, he emigrated to

West Germany West Germany was the common English name for the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG) from its formation on 23 May 1949 until German reunification, its reunification with East Germany on 3 October 1990. It is sometimes known as the Bonn Republi ...

and became an employee of the Allianz AG

insurance company Insurance is a means of protection from financial loss in which, in exchange for a fee, a party agrees to compensate another party in the event of a certain loss, damage, or injury. It is a form of risk management, primarily used to protect ...

. In his free time, he occupied himself with

Polish culture The culture of Poland () is the product of its Geography of Poland, geography and distinct historical evolution, which is closely connected to History of Poland, an intricate thousand-year history. Poland has a Catholic Church, Roman Catholic ma ...

and with Polish literary translation, and maintained contact with anti-communist Polish

dissident A dissident is a person who actively challenges an established political or religious system, doctrine, belief, policy, or institution. In a religious context, the word has been used since the 18th century, and in the political sense since the 2 ...

and émigré writers. Dedecius remarked ... "Only when I had gotten myself set up in life and enjoyed some stability was I able to turn to literature in a long-term and systematic way, although my career, you could say, had nothing whatever to do with writing." In the introduction to the Polish edition of "On Translating," Jerzy Kwiatkowski wrote: "Speaking formally, one could say that this translator’s great work came about on his evenings off, as a result of a hobby." In 1959, he published his first anthology, ''Lektion der Stille'' (Lesson of Silence). In the following years, he translated, so to speak in his free time, such well-known Polish writers as Zbigniew Herbert,

Stanisław Jerzy Lec Stanisław Jerzy Lec (; 6 March 1909 – 7 May 1966), born Baron Stanisław Jerzy de Tusch-Letz, was a Polish aphorist and poet. Often mentioned among the greatest writers of post-war Poland, he was one of the most influential aphorists of the ...

Czesław Miłosz Czesław Miłosz ( , , ; 30 June 1911 – 14 August 2004) was a Polish Americans, Polish-American poet, prose writer, translator, and diplomat. He primarily wrote his poetry in Polish language, Polish. Regarded as one of the great poets of the ...

, Tadeusz Różewicz and

Wisława Szymborska Maria Wisława Anna SzymborskaVioletta Szostagazeta.pl, 9 February 2012. ostęp 11 February 2012 (; 2 July 1923 – 1 February 2012) was a Polish people, Polish poet, essayist, translator, and recipient of the 1996 Nobel Prize in Liter ...

. He also published essays on

Polish literature Polish literature is the literary tradition of Poland. Most Polish literature has been written in the Polish language, though other languages used in Poland over the centuries have also contributed to Polish literary traditions, including Latin, ...

and his own literary translation techniques. In 1980, he initiated the German Poland Institute in

Darmstadt Darmstadt () is a city in the States of Germany, state of Hesse in Germany, located in the southern part of the Frankfurt Rhine Main Area, Rhine-Main-Area (Frankfurt Metropolitan Region). Darmstadt has around 160,000 inhabitants, making it the ...

. He served as the institute's director from 1980 through 1997. Meanwhile, continued his literary activities. Dedecius’ main achievements were the 50-volume "Polish Library"

canon Canon or Canons may refer to: Arts and entertainment * Canon (fiction), the material accepted as officially written by an author or an ascribed author * Literary canon, an accepted body of works considered as high culture ** Western canon, th ...

, which appeared between 1982 and 2000 from the

Suhrkamp Verlag Suhrkamp Verlag is a German publishing house, established in 1950 and is generally acknowledged as one of the leading European publishers of fine literature. Its roots go back to the "arianized" part of the S. Fischer Verlag. In January 2010, ...

publishing house and the 7-volume "Panorama of Polish Literature of the 20th Century" (1996–2000), whose final volume presented a kind of Dedecius autobiography. Dedecius died in

Frankfurt Frankfurt am Main () is the most populous city in the States of Germany, German state of Hesse. Its 773,068 inhabitants as of 2022 make it the List of cities in Germany by population, fifth-most populous city in Germany. Located in the forela ...

, Germany on 26 February 2016 at the age of 94.

Honors

Dedecius received many

honorary doctorate An honorary degree is an academic degree for which a university (or other degree-awarding institution) has waived all of the usual requirements. It is also known by the Latin phrases ''honoris causa'' ("for the sake of the honour") or '' ad hon ...

s, prizes and awards. In 1967, he was awarded the Johann-Heinrich-Voß-Preis für Übersetzung. In 1990, he received the

Friedenspreis des Deutschen Buchhandels is an international peace prize awarded annually by the Börsenverein des Deutschen Buchhandels (), which runs the Frankfurt Book Fair. The award ceremony is held in the Paulskirche in Frankfurt. The prize has been awarded since 1950. The re ...

, in 1997 the Samuel-Bogumil-Linde-Preis. Since 2004, the Robert Bosch Stiftung, in cooperation with the German Poland institute, awards the Karl-Dedecius-Preis for translators, which is endowed with a prize of €10,000.Karl-Dedecius-Preis page on the German Poland Institute site
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References

This article is a translation of the equivalent German-language Wikipedia article (retrieved 17 August 2006). The following references are cited by that German-language article:

Works

*1971: ''Deutsche und Polen. Botschaft der Bücher.'' ermans and Poles: The Diplomacy of BooksMünchen: Hanser. . *1974 ''"Überall ist Polen"'' oland is Everywhere Frankfurt a.M.: Suhrkamp. *1975: ''Polnische Profile'' olish Profiles Frankfurt a.M.: Suhrkamp. . *1981: ''Zur Literatur und Kultur Polens'' n the Literature and Culture of PolandFrankfurt a.M.: Suhrkamp. *1981: ''Polnische Pointen Satiren und kleine Prosa des 20.Jahrhunderts'' Karl Dedecius. Ullstein Buch *1986: ''Vom Übersetzen. Theorie und Praxis'' n Translating: Theory and PracticeFrankfurt a.M.: Suhrkamp. . *1988: ''Von Polens Poeten'' n Poland’s PoetsFrankfurt a.M.: Suhrkamp. . *1990: ''Lebenslauf aus Büchern und Blättern'' Curriculum Vitae Made of Books and PagesFrankfurt a.M.: Suhrkamp. . *1996: ''Ost West Basar. Ansprachen Essays Würdigungen.'' ast-West Bazaar: Addresses, Essays and AppreciationsWith a Foreword by Marion Gräfin Dönhoff. Selected and with an Afterword by Andreas Lawaty. Zürich: Ammann-Verlag. *2000: ''Panorama der polnischen Literatur des 20. Jahrhunderts. Abt.V. Panorama. Ein Rundblick'' anorama of Polish Literature of the 20th Century: Section V. Panorama.Zürich: Ammann-Verlag. . *2002: ''Die Kunst der Übersetzung'' he Art of TranslatingBerlin: Logos Verlag. . *2006: ''Ein Europäer aus Lodz : Erinnerungen'' European from Lodz: MemoirsFrankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp,

Literature

*Elvira Grözinger, Andreas Lawaty (Eds.): ''Suche die Meinung: Karl Dedecius, dem Übersetzer und Mittler zum 65. Geburtstag'' earching for the Opinion: Festschrift for the Translator and Intermediary Karl Dedecius on his 65th BirthdayWiesbaden 1986, Otto Harrassowitz. . *Manfred Mack (Ed.): "Karl Dedecius und das Deutsche Polen-Institut. Laudationes, Berichte, Interviews, Gedichte" arl Dedecius and the German Poland Institute. Laidatios, Reports, Interviews, Poems Darmstadt 1991, Justus von Liebig Verlag, . *Hubert Orłowski: ''Karl Dedecius'', in Marek Zybura (Ed.): ''...nie będzie nigdy Niemiec Polakowi bratem...?'' Wrocław: Okis. pp. 268–279. .

References

External links

Marion Gräfin Dönhoff, „Beheimatet in Polen und Deutschland. Aus einer Laudatio auf Karl Dedecius...“, DIE ZEIT 11/1986Marion Gräfin Dönhoff, „Mittler zwischen schwierigen Nachbarn“, DIE ZEIT 04/2002Karl-Dedecius-Archiv im Collegium PolonicumDeutsches Polen-Institut, DarmstadtFriedenspreis des Deutschen Buchhandels
{{DEFAULTSORT:Dedecius, Karl 1921 births 2016 deaths German prisoners of war in World War II held by the Soviet Union Writers from Łódź People from Łódź Voivodeship (1919–1939) Translators from Polish Translators from Russian Translators to German German translation scholars Knights Commander of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany Commanders of the Order of Merit of the Republic of Poland 20th-century German translators Naturalized citizens of Germany 20th-century German male writers German male non-fiction writers Writers from Darmstadt Recipients of the Order of the White Eagle (Poland) Reich Labour Service members German Army personnel of World War II Polish emigrants to Germany