The Mrozek Reader
Written by Slawomir Mrozek
Edited by Daniel Gerould

Slawomir Mrozek has reigned as the preeminent playwright of Eastern Europe for the past half century. This landmark new edition compiles his inventive and extraordinary work into one volume for the first time. In the early 1950s Mrozek was briefly a young enthusiast for the new Communist regime, but, during the Cold War, he grew into one of the sharpest critics of totalitarianism. He left Poland for the West in 1964, preferring to write abroad, and when he denounced the Soviet-led invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968, his works were banned for a five-year period not only in his native Poland, but also in all Eastern bloc countries.

Long recognized as a major literary figure, Mrozek began to visit Poland in the 1980s, and after the fall of Communism he eventually returned to Krakow where he now lives. This reissue of fourteen plays and ten short stories affirms Mrozek's mastery of a wide spectrum of styles and illustrates the development of his talent over the decades. From the vantage point of the twenty-first century, Mrozek's questioning of authority, his razor-sharp sense of the comic, and his spirit of contradiction seem as fresh, and as relevant, as ever.

"Every culture needs to think about language and power. [Mrozek's] plays have a lot to teach us."
MARGO JEFFERSON, The New York Times

"Mrozek's brief fables are something like Kafka's stories, but they're funnier"
The Spectator

SLAWOMIR MROZEK was born in Poland in 1930. He studied architecture and painting, and has worked as a journalist for various Polish newspapers and periodicals. Translations of his works have appeared in almost every European language, and his plays have been performed throughout the world, as well in his native Poland. He continues to write and draw from his home in Krakow.

Publishing House: Grove Press, New York 2004
SoftCover book measuring 6" x 9"
736 pages
English Language Version

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