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(b. 1958) – a writer, poet, literary critic, historian of literature and professor of the humanities. Nasiłowska is a Polish Studies graduate from the…
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Essay
Poetry
Piotr Sommer
(b. 1948) – a poet, essayist and translator of contemporary American and English poetry.
He is a graduate of English Studies at the University of Warsaw, a member of the Polish Writers’ Association (until 2020) and PEN Club, from 1994–2022 editor-in-chief of Literatura na Świecie. He has translated such English and American poets as John Ashbery, Ciaran Carson, Seamus Heaney, Robert Lowell, Frank O’Hara and Charles Reznikoff. Sommer edited the ‘blue issue’ of Literatura na Świecie (as number 7/1986 is called), entirely devoted to the poets of the New York School, who were known world wide, but practically absent in Poland.
Piotr Sommer made his debut in 1971 with poems in the Poezja monthly; the same year, his first translations appeared in Literatura na Świecie – poems by Brian Patten. Since then, he has published poems, reviews and translations in such journals as Odra, Twórczość and Oficyna Poetów. He has published upwards of a dozen volumes of poetry and literary criticism, edited many important anthologies (including those of contemporary American, British and Irish poetry).
The protagonist of Sommer’s poetry is fascinated by the world’s potential (‘Wonder how the world / will join tomorrow and the next day’) and its virtual and insoluble nature (‘If something else is the matter, / tell me what’). He poses simple questions that turn out to be philosophical/existential, he writes highly conversational poems, marked with a certain adolescence. His language is colloquial, not shying from family sayings and subjective truths – as if a poem were to be a sincere and exhaustive response to a casual ‘What’s up?”
Children often appear in Sommer’s poetry. This is, firstly, because this is poetry from a very fatherly perspective, also because the position of the spoken subject is expressed through care (for a kid who has knocked his head on the terrace, for children crying in the night); and secondly because the poet’s linguistic imagination remains that of a child, fascinated, for instance, by what is on the other side of the Miedzeszyński Embankment. Reality past the levee seems like a totally differently part of the world for Sommer – this is how children look, or those poets who, as adults, still have the courage to misspeak, banter, and put – in all plainness – what is ‘in their heads’ into poems. It is discoveries of this kind, both important and accidental, from which Piotr Sommer’s poems grow – full of astonishment at the nature of language and its capabilities. ‘Because if a person hears themselves / then maybe it exists, […] and later, from that voice / they may even recognise themselves’.
This poet puts special emphasis on the subjective, the relational, interpersonal, but also the accidental and impersonal; sometimes he seems to be shining a light on the peripheral. The critics have called him a ‘declared provincial’ (let us recall: Piotr Sommer once used the pseudonym P. Odmiejski), and his poems have been described as full of ‘details of the outskirts of Warsaw’. He is interested in details because, to his mind, life ‘is increasingly made of trifles’. Sommer surely took his confidence in the poetic power of the small, private and concrete from Anglo-Saxon poetry. At the same time, he remains a poet who is highly attuned to the melody of words and sentences. We might hazard saying that his motto is: ‘Read as if you were meant to listen, / not to understand’.
Piotr Sommer has won many literary awards, including the Barbara Sadowska Literary Award (1988), the Kościelski Foundation Award (1988), the Crystal Vilenica Slavic Award (2007) and Wrocław’s Silesius Poetry Award (2010) for lifetime achievement; he was twice nominated for the Nike Literary Award (in 2006 for ‘Po stykach’ [Through the Points] and in 2010 for ‘Dni i noce’ [Days and Nights]). In 2020, he received the Gdynia Literary Award for his translation of Charles Reznikoff, What are you doing in our street, and in 2022, the City of Warsaw Literary Award in the ‘Warsaw Writer’ category. In 2023, he received the Wrocław Silesius Poetry Award for ‘Lata praktyki’ (Years of Practice).
Bibliography
poetry:
- W krześle, Cracow: Wydawnictwo Literackie, 1977.
- Pamiątki po nas, Cracow: Wydawnictwo Literackie, 1980.
- Przed snem [poetry for children], Warsaw: Nasza Księgarnia, 1981; ed.: Wrocław, edition 2nd extended: Biuro Literackie, 2008.
- Kolejny świat (1976–1979), Warsaw: Czytelnik, 1983.
- Czynnik liryczny, Cracow: Oficyna Literacka, 1986;
- Czynnik liryczny i inne wiersze (1980–1986), London: Aneks, 1988.
- Erraty wybrane (kwiat dzieł użytkowych), Wrocław: Pomona, 1997.
- Nowe stosunki wyrazów (wiersze z lat siedemdziesiątych i osiemdziesiątych), Poznań: Wydawnictwo a5, 1997.
- Piosenka pasterska, Legnica: Centrum Sztuki – Teatr Dramatyczny, 1999.
- Rano na ziemi, Poznań: WBPiCAK, 2009.
- Dni i noce, Wrocław: Biuro Literackie, 2009; 2nd revised edition: Wrocław: Biuro Literackie, 2009; 3rd edition also revised: Wrocław: Biuro Literackie, 2010.
- Wiersze ze słów, Wrocław: Pomona, 2009; wyd. drugie, zmienione, Poznań: WBPiCAK, 2012.
- Po ciemku też (wiersze z książek), Poznań: WBPiCAK, 2013.
- Fruwajka, Wrocław: Wrocławskie Wydawnictwo Warstwy, 2015.
- Lata praktyki, Poznań: WBPiCAK, 2022.
- Siedemdziesiąt siedem, Kołobrzeg: Biuro Literackie, 2025.
short stories:
- Środki do pielęgnacji chmur, Poznań: WBPiCAK, 2024.
sketches and interviews:
- Zapisy rozmów. Wywiady z poetami brytyjskimi, Warsaw: Czytelnik: 1985; wyd. poprawione: Wrocław: Biuro Literackie, 2010.
- Smak detalu i inne ogólniki, Lublin: Stowarzyszenie Literackie „Kresy”, 1995.
- Po stykach, Gdańsk: słowo / obraz terytoria, 2005.
- Ucieczka w bok (pytania i odpowiedzi), Wrocław: Biuro Literackie, 2010; wyd. poszerzone: Poznań: WBPiCAK, 2016.
- Kolekcja wiosenna, Poznań: WBPiCAK, 2020.
translation works (from English):
anthologies:
- Antologia nowej poezji brytyjskiej (with Jarosław Aders and Bohdan Zadura: 22 poetów brytyjskich: Ciaran Carson, Stewart Conn, Seamus Deane, Douglas Dunn, John Fuller, Ian Hamilton, Tony Harrison, David Harsent, Seamus Heaney, Glyn Hughes, Brian Jones, Michael Longley, Derek Mahon, Andrew Motion, Paul Muldoon, Frank Ormsby, Brian Patten, Tom Paulin, William Peskett, Craig Raine, Jeffrey Wainwright, Hugo Williams), Warsaw: Czytelnik, 1983.
- Sześciu poetów północnoirlandzkich (Ciaran Carson, Seamus Heaney, Michael Longley, Derek Mahon, Paul Muldoon, Tom Paulin), Warsaw: Świat Literacki, 1993.
- Artykuły pochodzenia zagranicznego (E. E. Cummings, John Berryman, Robert Lowell, Frank O’Hara, John Ashbery, Allen Ginsberg, Charles Reznikoff), Gdańsk: Marabut, 1996.
- O krok od nich. Przekłady z poetów amerykańskich (Charles Reznikoff, E.E. Cummings, John Berryman, Robert Lowell, Allen Ginsberg, John Cage, Frank O’Hara, John Ashbery, Kenneth Koch, August Kleinzahler), Wrocław: Biuro Literackie, 2006.
- O nich tutaj (książka o języku i przekładzie), Cracow–Warsaw: Instytut Książki, 2016.
books:
- Brian Patten, Słoń i kwiat. Prawie-bajki, Warsaw: Krajowa Agencja Wydawnicza, 1982; 2nd edition revised: Wrocław: Biuro Literackie, 2009.
- Robert Lowell, Poezje (with Stanisław Barańczak, Michał Sprusiński and Bolesław Taborski), Cracow: Wydawnictwo Literackie, 1986.
- Frank O’Hara, Twoja pojedynczość, Warsaw: Państwowy Instytut Wydawniczy, 1987.
- Charles Reznikoff, Graffiti. 67 wierszy z lat 1920–1975, Sanok: Sanocki Dom Kultury, 1991.
- John Ashbery, No i wiesz (with Andrzej Sosnowski i Bohdan Zadur), Warsaw: Fundacja Literatura Światowa – Duszniki Zdrój: Muzeum Papiernictwa w Dusznikach, 1993.
- Christopher Logue, Dawno temu na pewnej małej planecie, Warsaw: The British Council Poland, Muzeum Książki Artystycznej w Łodzi, 1997.
- Ciaran Carson, Tak, tak, Legnica: Centrum Sztuki – Teatr Dramatyczny, 1998.
- Ciaran Carson, To pewnie Irlandczycy, Warsaw: The British Council Poland, Muzeum Książki Artystycznej w Łodzi, 1998.
- Seamus Heaney, Kolejowe dzieci. Wiersze i prozy, Legnica: Centrum Sztuki – Teatr Dramatyczny, 1998; 2nd edition extended: Wrocław, Biuro Literackie, 2010.
- Michael Longley, Lodziarz z Lisburn Road (with Bohdan Zadura), Legnica: Centrum Sztuki – Teatr Dramatyczny, 1998.
- Michael Longley, Od kwietnia do kwietnia, Warsaw: The British Council Poland, Muzeum Książki Artystycznej w Łodzi, 1998.
- Derek Mahon, Wszystko będzie dobrze, Legnica: Centrum Sztuki – Teatr Dramatyczny, 1998.
- Douglas Dunn, Wyprowadzka z Terry Street i inne wiersze, Legnica: Centrum Sztuki – Teatr Dramatyczny, 1999.
- C. Raine, Wolny przekład, Legnica: Centrum Sztuki – Teatr Dramatyczny, 1999.
- D.J. Enright, Raj w obrazkach, Legnica: Biuro Literackie, 2003; 2nd edition revised: Wrocław: Biuro Literackie, 2008.
- Brian Patten, Skaczący Myszka, Wrocław: Biuro Literackie, 2011.
- Brian Patten, „Teraz będziemy spać, leżeć bez ruchu lub ubierzemy się na powrót (with Jerzy Jarniewicz, Tadeusz Sławek and Andrzej Szuba), Wrocław: Biuro Literackie, 2011.
- Bertolt Brecht, Ten cały Brecht: Przekłady i szkice (with Jacek Stanisław Buras, Jakub Ekier i Andrzej Kopacki), Wrocław: Biuro Literackie, 2012.
- Kenneth Koch, Tysiąc sztuk awangardowych, Poznań: WBPiCAK, 2019.
- Charles Reznikoff, Co robisz na naszej ulicy, Poznań: WBPiCAK, 2019.
- Charles Reznikoff, Muzykant (with Marcin Szuster), Poznań: WBPiCAK, 2024.
Translations
English:
- Things to Translate & Other Poems [selected poetry], trans. P. Sommer and others., Newcastle upon Tyne: Bloodaxe Books, 1991.
- Continued [selected poetry], trans. Halina Janod and others., Middletown: Wesleyan University Press, 2005.
German:
- Ein freier Tag im April [selected poetry], trans. Doreen Daume, Wien: Edition Korrespondenzen, 2002.
- Im Dunkeln auch [Po ciemku też], trans. Renate Schmidgall, Berlin: Matthes & Seitz, 2010.
Romanian:
- Dimineaţa pe pământ [selected poetry], trans. Constantin Geambaşu, Bistriţa: Editura Charmides, 2015.
Slovak:
- Lyrický činiteľ a iné básne [Czynnik liryczny i inne wiersze], trans. Karol Chmel, Bratislava: Edícia Artefakty – Ars Poetica, 2007.
Slovenian:
- Lirični dejavnik in druge pesmi [Czynnik liryczny i inne wiersze], trans. Primož Čučnik; Ljubljana: Aleph, 2004.
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