Wschodni Express | Book launch: Tania Malarczuk “Jak zostałam świętą” | discussion with: Anna Łazar – translator, Marta Odulińska – moderator | Workshops of Culture, Grodzka 7 – patio POL, PJM

About the Book

At its heart, this book is a collection of interconnected stories, populated by shifting characters and guided by an all-knowing narrator. The narrative’s true architect is a girl, who single-handedly invents worlds, heroes, and heroines. With a flick of her imagination, she reshapes power dynamics and uncovers hidden plots. It’s a vibrant testament to the transformative power of literature and the boundless reaches of imagination, underscored by a keen, queer-inflected satire of post-Soviet psychological archetypes.
The settings are as vivid as the characters: a guesthouse that defies its own dimensions, a small town where a self-appointed committee keeps a watchful eye on its heroines, and an apartment where boundaries blur, giving way to hallway geysers and volcanic rabbits.

The guesthouse is even intentionally submerged, inviting canoe excursions. In town, two enigmatic women—possibly mother and daughter, or perhaps lovers—ignite a stir with their telescope and surprising intellect. Ultimately, the book celebrates the unfettered girlish fantasy that possesses the remarkable ability to conjure textual universes.

About the authors

Tania Malarczuk – Born in 1983 in Ivano-Frankivsk, this Ukrainian writer, essayist, and journalist holds a degree in Ukrainian philology from Vasyl Stefanyk Precarpathian National University. She has authored several prose books and received numerous accolades, including the Vilenica Crystal (2013), the Joseph Conrad-Korzeniowski Literary Award (2013), the BBC Book of the Year Award (2019, for her novel Oblivion), the Ingeborg Bachmann Prize (2018), the Usedom Literary Award (2022), and the Jeanette Schocken Prize (2024). Her works have been translated into Polish, German, English, Romanian, Czech, and Belarusian. She also contributes essays to Deutsche Welle and Die Zeit Online. Since 2011, she has lived in Vienna.

Anna Łazar is the curator of the Wolne Słowo international artistic cooperation program within the Gdańsk City of Literature project. She is a versatile professional, known for creating projects, authoring texts, translating, and lecturing. Since 2020, she has taught in the Postgraduate Gender Studies program named after Maria Konopnicka and Maria Dulębianka at the Institute of Literary Research of the Polish Academy of Sciences,  and at the Institute of Art of the Polish Academy of Sciences since 2019.
Her editorial work includes Aleksandra Kubiak’s art book, I Will Make a Heart (BWA Zielona Góra, 2022). As a translator, her notable works include Ilya Kaminsky’s Deaf Republic and, as a co-translator, Oksana Zabuzhko’s Planet of Wormwood. Łazar has also curated numerous art exhibitions.
Her extensive public diplomacy experience includes serving as deputy director and acting director of the Polish Institutes in Kyiv (2008–2014) and Saint Petersburg (2015–2018) while at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. She was also a curator at the Museum of Art in Łódź (2021–2022). Since 2025, Anna Łazar has held the position of director of the Center for Contemporary Art at the Ujazdowski Castle.