Meeting with Ana Blandiana

On May 28, at 6 p.m., the International Cultural Centre, the Romanian Cultural Institute in Warsaw and the Krakow Film Festival invite film and literature lovers to the "Ravens Hall" for a meeting with Ana Blandiana, poet, novelist, essayist and civic activist, honored in 2016 with the City of Gdansk's "European Poet of Freedom" Award for her book "My A4 Homeland."

Guest speakers Ana Blandiana and literary critic Anna Marchewka will discuss the power of poetry in times of dictatorship and the power of literature as a moral beacon in times of freedom. The conversation will be translated by Joanna Kornaś-Warwas. Ana Blandiana's presence in Krakow is connected with the world premiere of the documentary film "Between Silence and Sin" directed by Diana Nicolae.

Ana Blandiana - Romanian novelist, poet, essayist and activist, involved in the struggle for civil liberty in Romania. She made her debut in 1959 in the pages of the Tribuna daily. Before the 1989 revolution, she was a famous dissident and human rights activist. Due to her political involvement, her work was banned in Romania from 1959-1964, 1985 and 1988-1989. One of the initiators of the Civic Alliance (which she chaired in 1991 and 2001) and the Civic Academy Foundation, which she still runs today. Under the aegis of the Council of Europe, she initiated and created in the former prison in Sighet, the Memorial for Victims of Communism and Resistance with a research center, where conferences, scientific sessions and exhibitions on totalitarian phenomena are held annually. She is the author of 25 volumes of poetry, in which she has dealt with existential, spiritual and sensual issues through to socio-political commentary on women's issues, as well as novels and volumes of political and social criticism. Blandiana's work has been translated into at least 24 languages, making her one of the most recognizable contemporary Romanian poets. In 2016, she won the "European Poet of Freedom" award in Gdansk for her volume of poems "My Homeland A" (translated by Joanna Kornaś-Warwas).

Anna Marchewka - literary scholar and literary critic. She has published in "Lampa", "Zadra", "Tygodnik Powszechny", "Znak", "Dwutygodnik", "Chimera", among others. Within the framework of cooperation with the monthly "Znak" she takes care of the column "Station: Literature". Member of the editorial board of "Czas Literatury". Co-hosted literary broadcasts on TVP Kultura and Radio Krakow. She is a co-founder of the Studio of Critical Questions at the Jagiellonian University's Department of Contemporary Criticism. (Source: Miłosz Festival)

Joanna Kornaś-Warwas - translator of Romania's most acclaimed contemporary writers. In 2016, she received the 2016 European Poet of Freedom Translation Award for her translation of Ana Blandiana's volume "My Homeland A4" and the Angelus Central European Literary Award for her translation of V. Vosganian's "Book of Whispers." Vosganiana. In 2017 she was awarded the Prize for Translator by the Romanian cultural and literary magazine Observator cultural. Joanna Kornaś-Warwas has translated books by writers such as Mircea Cărtărescu, Ioana Pârvulescu, Ana Blandiana, Max Blecher, Matei Vișniec, Dan Lungu, Lucian Boia, Ioan Es. Pop, Dan Coman and others.