Book Talk

16 June | Antonia Lloyd Jones: Book Launch ‘The Penguin Book of Polish Short Stories’

• Date: Monday, June 16, 2025
• Time: 7pm for 7.30pm

An ideal way to explore twentieth century Polish literature is to read the witty and sparkling collection within The Penguin Book of Polish Short Stories. The thirty-nine short stories include ‘Miss Winczewska’, by the acclaimed writer Maria Dąbrowska (1889-1965), based on her experience of helping to establish a library for soldiers at the Citadel in Warsaw during the inter-war period. ‘In the Shadow of Brooklyn’ by Stanislaw Dygat (1914-78) is a comical tale about a young man envying his father’s seeming success with women. Contemporary authors include Nobel Prize winner Olga Tokarczuk (born 1962), who’s historical story ‘The Green Children’ is set in 1656, narrated by a Scottish doctor who, as the Polish king’s physician, travels through the wilds of Poland and encounters two feral children.

This anthology was curated and translated by Antonia Lloyd-Jones, a British translator of Polish literature based in London. She has translated works by several of Poland’s leading contemporary novelists and reportage authors, as well as crime fiction, poetry and children’s books. In 2018 Antonia won the Transatlantyk Award for the most outstanding promoter of Polish literature abroad, and is best known as the long-time translator of Olga Tokarczuk’s works in English, including Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead, shortlisted for the International Booker Prize in 2019.