This anthology contains over four hundred sixty works by sixty-eight authors and encompasses poems written outside of Poland between 1939 and 1999. Written in France, England, Ireland, Hungary, Germany, Belgium and Italy, in Soviet Union, on Middle East, in Australia, Canada, United States and in South America.
It is divided into three very different sections.
The first is primarily historical and documentary in nature and focuses on a specific subject, seeking to demonstrate how Polish poetry during World War II reflected historical events and the tragic fate and difficult experiences of Poles. The poems in this section reflect a broad range of emotions and draw on a number of ideological motifs; they show the metamorphoses and changes in values that came to form the basis for many poetic trends and attitudes in the post-war period.
The second section of the book constitutes a proposal for a canon of Polish émigré poetry produced by writers born before 1920. The poems of Czesław Miłosz, Kazimierz Wierzyński, and Wacław Iwaniuk are assigned a leading role in the proposed canon.
Section three presents the output of poets born after 1920. It contains a significant number of works by poets who lived and worked beyond their homeland immediately after the war, including the group of exceptional poets who between 1959 and 1962 worked closely with the publishers of the magazine "Kontynenty" ("Continents"). The section also includes the works of poets who began writing while still in Poland and continued or continue to produce poems abroad (Barańczak, Zagajewski, Bierezin, Broda, and others).
- **dz:Antologia poezji polskiej na obczyźnie 1939-1999 /
Anthology of Polish Émigré Poetry 1939-1999**
Selected, edited, and with a preface by Bogdan Czaykowski
Spółdzielnia Wydawnicza CZYTELNIK, Warszawa 2002, Polski Fundusz Wydawniczy w Kanadzie, Toronto 2002
632 pages, hardcover
ISBN 83-07-02846-9
www.czytelnik.pl