Poetry of Wisława Szymborska
- to This is a past program
Co-presented by the UCLA Department of Slavic Languages & Literatures and the Hammer Poetry Series
Polish artist and Holocaust survivor Alina Szapocznikow reflected on the ephemeral condition of human life in her work. This program presents the work of the late Polish poet Wisława Szymborska to provide cultural context for Szapocznikow’s experience. Szymborska, born in Prowent, Poland, in 1923, won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1996 “for poetry that with ironic expression allows the historical and biological context to come to light in fragments of human reality.” Szymborska died earlier this year in Krakow. She was 88. Actress Beata Pozniak and poet-scholar Piotr Florczyk and read from her works, both in English and in their original Polish. Introduced by Roman Koropeckyj, UCLA Professor of Slavic Languages & Literatures.
In conjunction with the exhibition Alina Szapocznikow: Sculpture Undone, 1955-1972.
This series of readings is organized and hosted by Stephen Yenser, poet and professor at UCLA and author of A Boundless Field: American Poetry at Large and Blue Guide.
Poetry is supported, in part, by the UCLA Department of English and Friends of English.
Public programs are made possible by Hammer Members and the generosity of Bronya and Andrew Galef, Good Works Foundation and Laura Donnelley, and an anonymous donor.
