OFF_press
Contemporary Polish Writing in Translation
“The information I had about Sopot was really limited: I resisted buying a travel guide, researching the area, or following a predetermined route. The journey had to be a meander, a ‘wandering walk’, that is, a ‘psycho-geographic’ journey and not a tourist trip, I wanted to provide more than just a recorded journey but actually feel like I had taken people there. I wanted to get the idea across of the delights and insights into visiting somewhere for the first time that is seen afresh with new eyes, and I hope to have captured that spontaneity in my images.”
38 year old Fine Art student, Katrina Burtles, set out with a simple intention. To travel from Southend library to Sopot library and document everything in between for an exhibition… read more by clicking on the foto on the right
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In preparation for the launch of Michael Moran’s A Country in the Moon
in Polish translation, click the link below to see Lilian Tietjen interviewing
the author last year, as part of our OFF_ filming trip across Poland.
OFF_VIDEO – Interview with Michael Moran
to buy the book in Polish, click on the image of the cover to the right…
Interview with Piotr Czerwinski – Justyna Daniluk
They say you are the voice of the most recent wave of Polish migration…
That voice means over two million desperados, if I correctly recall the latest statistics. They speak for themselves, with their own voices. In fact it’s more than speech, they shout, though no one seems to want to listen or is pretending not to. I only speak for some, perhaps unwittingly for others, but certainly not in the name of them all. In fact, I’m pretty sure I only speak for myself! But thank you for the compliment. Without reverting to metaphor, I think it’s quite a responsibility, to speak on behalf of others, especially in the name of a vast group of others. Also, belonging to such a group is a challenge. All my life I’ve avoided being “part” of anything like the plague. I’ve never identified with anyone and anything else, refused to make declarations, display emblems, wear ideals on my sleeve. I was afraid my independence would be lost, which is after all not to be surrendered. But it’s only since I emigrated that I finally realised that I do identify with some kind of “crowd”, that I belong to it, and that I’m actually proud of the fact, that it’s nothing to be ashamed of. It happened when I was watching the news on British television and heard a newsreader say something about Poles, maybe even “the Polish problem” in this part of the world, as it seems a few people are fans of this phrase. And then I understood that I am one of these Poles. One of them, one of US. This was hard, trust me, it cut me in half. Being cut in half is another thing which I’ve avoided like the plague, for as long as a I could.
In “Przebiegum Życiae” I pose the question: “Are we different? No, hell, not at all. Only our surnames are spelt different, but this means nothing, no one can pronounce them anyway, no one apart from us. We are the union of many in one, one person who’s received a collective kick up the arse…”
Please visit our Multimedia section for a selection of photos from our recent filming trip around Poland…
At first, I only saw the face. A delicate smile reflected in the window of the underground carriage I was riding. The eyes of a spirit. The one who visited me several hours later – dressed in a khaki uniform, it saluted and stood there in silence. Heavy drops of rain fell from us, right into the earth beneath our feet, smelling of spring.
In the morning, I knew time had come to tell his story.
