Twórczość

Twórczość has been published continually since August 1945.

This monthly journal came about in Krakow on the initiative of Kazimierz Wyka, a professor at the Jagiellonian University, and Karol Kuryluk, editor of the pre-war Sygnały; it then bore the sub-title ‘a critical literary monthly’. The first issue featured poems by Leopold Staff, Julian Przyboś and Czesław Miłosz, short stories by Jarosław Iwaszkiewicz and Jerzy Andrzejewski, reportage by Tadeusz Peiper on his journey through the Sakha Republic, columns by Hanna Malewska and Jerzy Zawieyski, and a sketch by Kazimierz Wyka.

In 1950, the journal moved to Warsaw. It was then published by the Czytelnik Publishing Co-operative, Artystyczne i Filmowe Publishers, Współczesne Publishers, the National Library, and, since 1 April 2010, the publisher has been the Book Institute, by order of the Minister of Culture and National Heritage. It has been run by: Kazimierz Wyka (1945−49), Adam Ważyk (1950−54), Jarosław Iwaszkiewicz (1955−80), Jerzy Lisowski (1980−2004), Bohdan Zadura (2004‒20), Mateusz Werner (2021‒24), and, since 2025, Darek Foks. Among the editors have been some outstanding writers, including Anna Kamieńska, Julian Stryjkowski, Andrzej Kijowski, Henryk Bereza, Ziemowit Fedecki, Zdzisław Najder and Wojciech Karpiński.

Twórczość does not reprint. It publishes contemporary Polish poetry and prose, essays on Polish and world literature, literary criticism, opinion pieces and literary sketches, as well as archival materials: diaries and correspondence of important figures on the Polish literary scene.

Its authors have been Nobel Prize winners (Wisława Szymborska, Czesław Miłosz), outstanding Polish poets, writers, translators and critics (including the late Tadeusz Różewicz, Zbigniew Herbert, Stanisław Grochowiak, Sławomir Mrożek, Marian Pankowski, Jan Błoński, Helena Zaworska, Henryk Markiewicz, Julia Hartwig and Urszula Kozioł, and such living writers as Julian Kornhauser, Wiesław Myśliwski and Andrzej Mencwel), as well as debutants.

Regular columnists became a tradition of the journal after the famed Daedalus Chronicles (by Andrzej Kijowski, who was prohibited from publishing under his real name) and Henryk Bereza’s ‘Read in Typescript’, to Marian Grześczak’s ‘Kiosk’ and Leszek Bugajski’s ‘Among the Periodicals’. In recent years these have included Tadeusz Komendant’s ‘On the Stone Steps’, ‘Notes of an Old Man’, ‘On the Base’ and ‘Ciukanda’, Szymon Wróbel’s ‘Sparrow on the Roof’, Janusz Drzewucki’s ‘On the Razor’s Edge’, Jerzy Olek’s ‘Down the Line’, Paweł Bagnowski’s ‘Humming’, Stanisław Aleksander Nowak’s ‘Four Letters by Five’, and recently, Zbigniew Mentzl’s ‘Diary’, Krzysztof Bielecki’s ‘also or’, Paweł Sołtys’s ‘Writing Book’ and Jerzy Franczak’s ‘Chronocycle’.

Two publishing series have emerged on the initiative of Twórczość. In 1992−98 thirteen volumes of the ‘green series’ came out (three in collaboration with Katowice’s Akapit publishers, and ten with the State Publishing Institute).

In 2012, along with our publisher, the Book Institute, we began a new series – the Twórczość Library, which has so far released four volumes.