Andrzej Stasiuk’s latest book starts with his recollections of old journeys about Poland and ends with a description of a journey into a remote Hungarian province in search of an atmosphere familiar from André Kertesz’s photographs. Driving to Babadag is the diary of a journey through Slovakia, Hungary and Romania, in other words, as Stasiuk provocatively puts it, “the less obvious countries”, “the adjunct countries” inhabited by “second-glance nations” whom he does however call “our Europe”, deliberately contrasting them with the affluent, self-satisfied West, as he said in a recent interview. “The marvellously silly illusion of these lands” is not really all that different from the reality of Europe that its distant, poor relatives find so exciting it’s an equally dubious Europe, just more firmly and effectively invented and given credence. Stasiuk is fascinated by the thin borderline dividing the primordial from the metaphysical, and traces it in his book. But his superbly written prose, blending reportage-style narrative and essay-style digression, is mainly a treatise on the forms of the world that are accessible to us. Stasiuk’s reality is corroded by things that aren’t obvious. It is a retort full of constant change, which is overshadowed by the slog of existence, even inscribed on the landscape, and which keeps on flying “into paroxysms and boredom that reign alternately in these parts”. Stasiuk’s description of this part of Europe seems to prove that justice does exist, at least the poetic kind.
Marek Zaleski
“Stasiuk’s work is leaning more and more strongly towards non-fiction, with description playing the main part. There’s nothing wrong with that, because he’s a true master of description”.
There are more than 31,000 publishers registered in Poland. However, the market is highly concentrated. The 300 largest publishing firms still hold almost 98 per cent of it. More »
