Szczepan Twardoch’s book has been nominated for the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) Literary Prize. When one of the portals wrote about “the success of the pole,” the writer corrected it on Facebook, reminding him that he was Silesia. A storm broke out. Some netizens told him to “get out of the way,” while others stood by him. The article title has already been changed.
Wirtualna informed Polska“The King,” translated by Sean Jasper Bay, was on the EBRD’s finalists list. This competition aims to support and promote foreign novels translated into English. There are 20,000 to win. The euro is divided equally – for the writer and the translator. Twardoch and Bye will compete with “The Pear Field” and “Mr. K. at Freedom”.
In 2019, the long list included, among other things, the book of Nobel Prize winner Olga Tokarczuk, “You may plow you among the bones of the dead”, but it did not reach the end. Last year, writer Hamid Ismailov, translator of “Devil’s Dance”, Donald Rayfield, Lithuanian Gregory Kanovich, and translator of “Devilspel” gave.
So that we can confidently talk about success. The only question is who: Polar or Silesian? This is really a tough nut to crack. Born in Knurów, Twardoch has been identifying with Silesia for years and would like Silesia to be recognized as a national minority, and their language as a regional language.
“In a perverted way, I am happy with every act of contempt and disregard that Poland shows to the inhabitants of Silesia. With every such act, somewhere, a man decides to cultivate his Silesian tendency out of malice. So I do not worry about the aggravation of this disagreement.” An interview for Onet.
And it must be admitted that Twardoch is consistent. First, he posted a short post on his personal Facebook page saying that reaching the end of his book is not a “pole success”. “Since I am not Polish, I am Silesian, and I have the impression, I have already mentioned it many times in public.” – Novelist Silesia confirmed.
After a while he had to edit his post because he got a lot of hate messages. He himself was also angry, and without being excessive in his words, he fired them in error.
“Apparently, after I’ve lived here all my life and dealt with Silesia’s identity, I have no idea about it, nor do those who have made me go on the road in response to this simple correction, or share my thoughts that it’s definitely fashion now, or strategic marketing, laughs.” To find it very funny that I write in Polish, not Polish, the world has not really seen it: I will not spend a minute convincing you of anything, because I care what you think of my beautiful head.
– Szczepan Twardoch writes.
We can only guess the content of the private messages, but we know some netizens agreed with him in the comments.
“Even congratulations to Qutub can offend,” “Identity Centrality >> in short” (pl. Short – ed.). No matter what you do or how often you advertise something. If you turn out to be useful, the magic slogan “We are all Polish” will appear like a doll from a pinned box, “so you will feel what I feel. All the time >> Politicians< و >> Journalists << In the media they only address Poles, and this is not mine, because I am a Greek citizen, a Polish citizen. – We read in the comments.
After the internet protests, wp.pl changed the title of its article. Now there is no “polar success” or “Silesian success”, but there is “Szczepan Twardoch success”.
Let’s add that this is not the first success of the Seleção artist recently. His novel “Kroll”, or rather “The King of Warsaw”, was among 10 titles on Amazon that Internet users from all over the world could download for free on the occasion of Book Day.
