A short-story writer and poet, born in 1962. She studied Polish philology at the Mickiewicz University in Poznań and Oriental Languages at the Jagiellonian University in Krakow. She is a student of the Tibetan language and of eastern religions. She emigrated in the mid-1980s and now lives in Hamburg.
Her two books, Fractale and The Book of Patés, are collections of short surrealistic-grotesque, comical-sad stories.
"Goerke has emerged as an elusive and subversive talent, troublesome and difficult to classify," writes Grażyna Borkowska in "Kresy". Goerke eludes all static interpretations: she carries on philosophical disputations in colloquial language, reduces national and cultural myths to absurdity and suspense, yokes commonplaces and archetypes together, and packs her narratives full of anecdotes illustrating human manners and morals. Like the definition of fractals (mathematical patterns that make order out of chaos), her narrative forms describe, capture, and interpret our natural environment: chaos.
"I put very little trust in words as such, or in fables. For me, there is no such thing as a fable for the sake of a fable. For me, the ideal prose is some sort of non-fabular prose." (Natasza Goerke)
Source: www.polska2000.pl; copyright: Stowarzyszenie Willa Decjusza.
Nominated for the Nike 2003 Award for her book 47 na odlew / 47 with a swing.
Bibliography:
- Fractale. Sklepy prześcieradłowe /Fractals: White Goods Shops, Poznań: Obserwator, 1994
- Księga pasztetów / The Book of Patés, Poznań: Obserwator, 1997
- Pożegnania plazmy / Farewells to Plasma, Gładyszów: Czarne, 1999
- 47 na odlew / 47 with a swing, Warszawa: Prószyński, 2002
Selected translations:
- English: Farewells to Plasma, Prague-New-York: Twisted Spoon Press, 2000
- German: Sibirische Palme. Erzählungen, Hamburg: Rospo, 1997; Abschied vom Plasma, Hamburg: Rospo, 2000