The Polish Book Institute

Prose writer, columnist and playwright Stanisław Aleksander Nowak talks about his fascination with Hrabal, Schulz, reveals which writer is the reason he joined the navy and what he read then, and explains why he will not publish any more novels.

Małgorzata Rejmer, a writer of prose and reporter, talks about readings that shaped her, 19th-century Gorky’s Russia, which reflects modern neoliberalism, the universality of reportage, a wall covered with quotations from Grochowiak, Ratoń, and Plath, the influence of Herta Müller, the technique of Svetlana Alexievich, as well as about her work on Błoto słodsze niż miód (“Mud Sweeter than Honey”), reading in the eternal state of a standby mode, and the benefits of silence.