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This selection of Tales by Polish authors was first published in'The World's Classics' in 1921 and reprinted in 1928, 1942, and1944.
THE OUTPOST. By BOLESLAW PRUS
A PINCH of SALT. By ADAM SZYMANSKI
KOWALSKI THE CARPENTER. By ADAM SZYMANSKI
FOREBODINGS. By STEFAN ZERKOMSKI
A POLISH SCENE. By WLADYSLAW ST. REYMONT
DEATH. By WLADYSLAW ST. REYMONT
THE SENTENCE. By J. KADEN-BANDROWSKI
'P.P.C.' By MME KYCIER-NALKOWSKA
My friend the late Miss Else C. M. Benecke left a number of Polishstories in rough translation, and I am carrying out her wishes inediting them and handing them over to English readers. In spite offailing health during the last years of her life, she worked hard attranslations from this beautiful but difficult language, and the twovolumes, Tales by Polish Authors and More Tales by PolishAuthors, published by Mr. Basil Blackwell at Oxford, were among thefirst attempts to make modern Polish fiction known in this country. Inboth these volumes I collaborated with her.
England is fortunate in counting Joseph Conrad among her own novelists;although a Pole by birth he is one of the greatest masters of Englishstyle. The Polish authors who have written in their own language haveperhaps been most successful in the short story. Often it is so slightthat it can hardly be called a story, but each of these sketchesconveys a distinct atmosphere of the country and the people, and showsthe individuality of each writer. The unhappy state of Poland for morethan 150 years has placed political and social problems in theforeground of Polish literature. Writers are therefore judged andappraised by their fellow-countrymen as much by their patriotism as bytheir literary and artistic merits.
Of the authors whose work is presented in this volume Prus(Aleksander Glowacki), the veteran of modern Polish novelists, is theone most loved by his own countrymen. His books are written partly witha moral object, as each deals with a social evil. But while he exposesthe evil, his warm heart and strong sense of justice—combined with asense of humour—make him fair and even generous to all.
The poignant appeal of Szymánski's stories lies in the fact thatthey are based on personal experiences. He was banished to Yakutsk inSiberia for six years when he was quite a young man and had barelyfinished his studies at the University of Warsaw, at a time when everyprofession of radicalism, however moderate, was punished severely bythe Russian authorities. He died, a middle-aged man, during the War,after many years of literary and journalistic activity in the interestof his country. Neither he nor Prus lived to see Poland free andrepublican, an ideal for which they had striven.
Zeromski is a writer of intense feeling. If Prus's kindly andsimple tales are the most beloved, Zeromski's more subtle psychologicaltreatment of his subjects is the most admired, and he is said to markan epoch in Polish fiction. In the two s