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Papers by Joanna Kosmalska

Routledge eBooks, Aug 11, 2022

Journal of Literary Theory

With a view to extending and enriching the vibrant, ongoing debate about migration and literature... more With a view to extending and enriching the vibrant, ongoing debate about migration and literature, this article makes an attempt to define »migration writing«. Using three perspectives – the theme-oriented, ethnic-oriented and text-oriented approaches – the paper examines the concept of »migration writing« in relation to other literary terms. Therefore, the starting point for the discussion is a brief comparison of migration writing with autobiography, travel writing and postcolonial literature. Then some useful comparisons are made to other related literary concepts, such as exile literature, refugee literature, foreigners’ literature, guest worker literature, Kanake literature, »allochthonous« literature, ethnic literature, minority literature, diasporic literature, hyphenated literature, multicultural literature, intercultural literature, émigré literature/emigrant literature, immigrant literature, migrant literature, the literature of migration. From these concepts, there emanat...

Uilleam Blacker Talks to Joanna Kosmalska (University of Łodź)1Joanna Kosmalska: How did you star... more Uilleam Blacker Talks to Joanna Kosmalska (University of Łodź)1Joanna Kosmalska: How did you start working with Molodyi Teatr?Uilleam Blacker: My wife, Olesya Khromeychuk, came up with the idea of starting the theatre group in 2010, and I was involved from the beginning, though not in all the early shows. At first, the group consisted of people who were already friends, mostly Ukrainians, but also Russians and Russian-speakers from Central Asia. The members have changed over the years. It's hazardous to work with migrants as they tend to come and go. Before Bloody East Europeans, we had to advertise for new members. Now, we have a mix of British people and Ukrainians. They come from all sorts of backgrounds and do very different day jobs-some work in construction, restaurants, market research, and a couple of us are academics. They also have very diverse experiences of immigration, from the straightforward to the very complicated.JK: Multicultural and multilingual plays have bec...

Studi Irlandesi : a Journal of Irish Studies, 2015

The following interviews with practitioners of Polish-Irish intercultural relations give voice to... more The following interviews with practitioners of Polish-Irish intercultural relations give voice to two Ireland-based Poles and two Irishmen who, in different ways, have reacted to and represented the new Polish presence in Ireland. Chris Binchy and Piotr Czerwinski have focused on the experiences of Polish labour migrants in Dublin in their respective novels Open-handed (2008) and Przebiegum zyciae (2009). Dermot Bolger explored, among other things, the historical parallels between Polish and Irish histories of migration in his play The Townlands of Brazil (2006). Anna Wolf is the artistic director and producer of the Dublin-based Polish Theatre Ireland (PTI).

Zeitschrift Fur Slavische Philologie, 2017

JOANNA KOSMALSKA: You're a British writer but you have Polish roots. What is your connection ... more JOANNA KOSMALSKA: You're a British writer but you have Polish roots. What is your connection to Poland?JOANNA CZECHOWSKA: My father was Polish. He came to the UK during the war in 1942. He fled Poland when the Germans invaded and almost literally walked across Europe. He headed west through Germany, then France, and eventually arrived in England. Here he joined the air force and became a paratrooper and a pilot. He was stationed in Newark, Nottinghamshire. Near the end of the war he met my mother at a dance for service men. They married in 1948 and settled down in Derby. Then my father arranged for his mother to come over from Warsaw and live with us. She was a widow, had no other children and was living in very sad circumstances.My grandmother had been living with us when I was born. She looked after me. She couldn't speak English, so she spoke Polish to me, and it became my first language. I don't remember her dying but everyone tells me I was extremely upset and full ...

JOANNA KOSMALSKA: In some of your recent works you tackle the issues of migration. Tell me, have ... more JOANNA KOSMALSKA: In some of your recent works you tackle the issues of migration. Tell me, have you ever lived outside Ireland?Roddy Doyle: Yes, I have. I spent five months in West Germany. I lived in London for several periods, which, added together, amounted to about a year. Later I went to New York for six months. When I was a student, I worked in Germany and London. The summers were very long. I would leave the day after the exams finished and I would come back, not on the day when college started, but on the day when you'd be struck offthe register if you didn't turn up. Once, I leftin early May and I came back in November.JK: How about New York?RD: In New York I was teaching in a college in Manhattan for a semester. I loved the city and I wouldn't mind spending more time there. We stayed in the States right through the winter. It was spectacular. Although we did not get any hurricane, we experienced the snowfall, which we have had a bit now in Ireland for the last...

Ireland in the European Eye

Open Cultural Studies

The article opens with a brief analysis of the publishing industry in the UK and Ireland to provi... more The article opens with a brief analysis of the publishing industry in the UK and Ireland to provide an informed assessment of how difficult it is for Polish migrant authors to establish their presence on the local literary market. It proceeds to show how these writers have been amazingly persistent in their efforts to win British and Irish readership by, for example, participating in literary competitions, submitting their work to literary journals, collaborating with local writers or self-publishing their work. Then some attention is given to how the process of writing a book in a non-native language engages the writers: they tend to adjust their texts to the international readership, become involved in the translation process, try their hand at writing in a foreign language, and prepare bilingual advertising materials. Why they feel such a strong need to be published in English is a question broached in the next part of the article. Finally, the closing section explores how the fa...

Text Matters - A Journal of Literature, Theory and Culture, 2011

Saturday sets out to depict the contemporary world with its ambiguities and paradox. In the novel... more Saturday sets out to depict the contemporary world with its ambiguities and paradox. In the novel, like in a mirror painting, every event, character and conflict is highlighted from diverse, often contradictory, angles by the narrator's extensive commentary, flashback and reference to other books. The prevailing happiness of mass protests against the war on Iraq is countered by the recollection of mass graves, an element of Saddam's callous regime, the real terrorist threat is contrasted with national paranoia, and the Prime Minister's performance of truthfulness is scrutinized by means of Paul Ekman's study of micro-expressions. The technique of dualistic depiction is further used in order to describe the characters. Reworking the idea of two sides of the same coin, McEwan offers the novel as a metaphorical study of the intricacies of human personality. Therefore, Baxter becomes simultaneously an offender and a victim, John Grammaticus turns from a successful poet i...

Routledge eBooks, Aug 11, 2022

Journal of Literary Theory

With a view to extending and enriching the vibrant, ongoing debate about migration and literature... more With a view to extending and enriching the vibrant, ongoing debate about migration and literature, this article makes an attempt to define »migration writing«. Using three perspectives – the theme-oriented, ethnic-oriented and text-oriented approaches – the paper examines the concept of »migration writing« in relation to other literary terms. Therefore, the starting point for the discussion is a brief comparison of migration writing with autobiography, travel writing and postcolonial literature. Then some useful comparisons are made to other related literary concepts, such as exile literature, refugee literature, foreigners’ literature, guest worker literature, Kanake literature, »allochthonous« literature, ethnic literature, minority literature, diasporic literature, hyphenated literature, multicultural literature, intercultural literature, émigré literature/emigrant literature, immigrant literature, migrant literature, the literature of migration. From these concepts, there emanat...

Uilleam Blacker Talks to Joanna Kosmalska (University of Łodź)1Joanna Kosmalska: How did you star... more Uilleam Blacker Talks to Joanna Kosmalska (University of Łodź)1Joanna Kosmalska: How did you start working with Molodyi Teatr?Uilleam Blacker: My wife, Olesya Khromeychuk, came up with the idea of starting the theatre group in 2010, and I was involved from the beginning, though not in all the early shows. At first, the group consisted of people who were already friends, mostly Ukrainians, but also Russians and Russian-speakers from Central Asia. The members have changed over the years. It's hazardous to work with migrants as they tend to come and go. Before Bloody East Europeans, we had to advertise for new members. Now, we have a mix of British people and Ukrainians. They come from all sorts of backgrounds and do very different day jobs-some work in construction, restaurants, market research, and a couple of us are academics. They also have very diverse experiences of immigration, from the straightforward to the very complicated.JK: Multicultural and multilingual plays have bec...

Studi Irlandesi : a Journal of Irish Studies, 2015

The following interviews with practitioners of Polish-Irish intercultural relations give voice to... more The following interviews with practitioners of Polish-Irish intercultural relations give voice to two Ireland-based Poles and two Irishmen who, in different ways, have reacted to and represented the new Polish presence in Ireland. Chris Binchy and Piotr Czerwinski have focused on the experiences of Polish labour migrants in Dublin in their respective novels Open-handed (2008) and Przebiegum zyciae (2009). Dermot Bolger explored, among other things, the historical parallels between Polish and Irish histories of migration in his play The Townlands of Brazil (2006). Anna Wolf is the artistic director and producer of the Dublin-based Polish Theatre Ireland (PTI).

Zeitschrift Fur Slavische Philologie, 2017

JOANNA KOSMALSKA: You're a British writer but you have Polish roots. What is your connection ... more JOANNA KOSMALSKA: You're a British writer but you have Polish roots. What is your connection to Poland?JOANNA CZECHOWSKA: My father was Polish. He came to the UK during the war in 1942. He fled Poland when the Germans invaded and almost literally walked across Europe. He headed west through Germany, then France, and eventually arrived in England. Here he joined the air force and became a paratrooper and a pilot. He was stationed in Newark, Nottinghamshire. Near the end of the war he met my mother at a dance for service men. They married in 1948 and settled down in Derby. Then my father arranged for his mother to come over from Warsaw and live with us. She was a widow, had no other children and was living in very sad circumstances.My grandmother had been living with us when I was born. She looked after me. She couldn't speak English, so she spoke Polish to me, and it became my first language. I don't remember her dying but everyone tells me I was extremely upset and full ...

JOANNA KOSMALSKA: In some of your recent works you tackle the issues of migration. Tell me, have ... more JOANNA KOSMALSKA: In some of your recent works you tackle the issues of migration. Tell me, have you ever lived outside Ireland?Roddy Doyle: Yes, I have. I spent five months in West Germany. I lived in London for several periods, which, added together, amounted to about a year. Later I went to New York for six months. When I was a student, I worked in Germany and London. The summers were very long. I would leave the day after the exams finished and I would come back, not on the day when college started, but on the day when you'd be struck offthe register if you didn't turn up. Once, I leftin early May and I came back in November.JK: How about New York?RD: In New York I was teaching in a college in Manhattan for a semester. I loved the city and I wouldn't mind spending more time there. We stayed in the States right through the winter. It was spectacular. Although we did not get any hurricane, we experienced the snowfall, which we have had a bit now in Ireland for the last...

Ireland in the European Eye

Open Cultural Studies

The article opens with a brief analysis of the publishing industry in the UK and Ireland to provi... more The article opens with a brief analysis of the publishing industry in the UK and Ireland to provide an informed assessment of how difficult it is for Polish migrant authors to establish their presence on the local literary market. It proceeds to show how these writers have been amazingly persistent in their efforts to win British and Irish readership by, for example, participating in literary competitions, submitting their work to literary journals, collaborating with local writers or self-publishing their work. Then some attention is given to how the process of writing a book in a non-native language engages the writers: they tend to adjust their texts to the international readership, become involved in the translation process, try their hand at writing in a foreign language, and prepare bilingual advertising materials. Why they feel such a strong need to be published in English is a question broached in the next part of the article. Finally, the closing section explores how the fa...

Text Matters - A Journal of Literature, Theory and Culture, 2011

Saturday sets out to depict the contemporary world with its ambiguities and paradox. In the novel... more Saturday sets out to depict the contemporary world with its ambiguities and paradox. In the novel, like in a mirror painting, every event, character and conflict is highlighted from diverse, often contradictory, angles by the narrator's extensive commentary, flashback and reference to other books. The prevailing happiness of mass protests against the war on Iraq is countered by the recollection of mass graves, an element of Saddam's callous regime, the real terrorist threat is contrasted with national paranoia, and the Prime Minister's performance of truthfulness is scrutinized by means of Paul Ekman's study of micro-expressions. The technique of dualistic depiction is further used in order to describe the characters. Reworking the idea of two sides of the same coin, McEwan offers the novel as a metaphorical study of the intricacies of human personality. Therefore, Baxter becomes simultaneously an offender and a victim, John Grammaticus turns from a successful poet i...