About the event

Book launch: Tania Malarczuk, “Bestiariusz” (translated from Ukrainian by Marta Odulińska). The event will feature: Tania Malarczuk – author, Marta Odulińska – translator, Ivan Davydenko – moderator.

About the book “Bestiariusz”

Drawing on its medieval predecessors, “Bestiariusz” is a collection of ten allegorical stories. It features a hen, a dog, a medusa, a rat, a crow, a snail, a pig, a hare, a puma, and a butterfly. These are stories of Gogolian “little people”, seasoned with a touch of surrealism and grotesque, whose common denominator is loneliness. They are all endowed with their own peculiarities as well. And although the protagonists might seem like pitiful figures, the author portrays them with a certain kind of tenderness.

Instead of extensive character descriptions, Tania Malarczuk masterfully uses detail and allusion. Her characters are not idealized – they are real. Their language is real too: simple, colloquial, and at times vulgar.

This book was published as part of the Literary Eastern Express project, implemented with the support of the European Union under the Creative Europe programme.

About the participants

Tania Malarczuk (born in 1983 in Ivano-Frankivsk) – Ukrainian writer, essayist, and journalist. She graduated in Ukrainian philology from the Vasyl Stefanyk Precarpathian National University. Author of several prose books. Recipient of numerous awards, including the Vilenica Crystal (2013), the Joseph Conrad-Korzeniowski Literary Award (2013), the BBC Book of the Year Award (for the novel “Zapomnienie”, published in Poland in 2019), the Ingeborg Bachmann Prize (2018), the Usedom Literary Prize (2022), and the Jeanette Schocken Prize (2024). Her works have been translated into Polish, German, English, Romanian, Czech, and Belarusian. She publishes essays and columns on the websites of Deutsche Welle and Die Zeit Online. She has lived in Vienna since 2011.

Marta Odulińska – graduate of Ukrainian studies at the University of Warsaw. Since her student years, she has wanted to translate literature, although she also has experience translating journalistic and practical texts. “Bestiariusz”, initially translated for herself, is her debut as a literary translator. Librarian (she works at the Municipal Public Library in Katowice) and reader, sharing her impressions of books on Instagram (@druk_i_nic_wiecej). She participated in organizing the 14th Forum of Young Librarians in Zabrze and Katowice (2022). She is interested in the countries of the former Soviet bloc, contemporary history, photography, architecture, climate crisis prevention, literature, and everything that can be found in a good reportage.

Ivan Davydenko – poet (“Halal”, paper_w_dole – Katalog Press, 2022; “Beniaminek”, WBW, 2026), columnist (podcast “Jak zostać Ukraińcem”, 2022; “Kącik wróżb i egzorcyzmów” in the quarterly “Czas Kultury”, since 2024). Since 2026, he has supported the Warsztaty Kultury Publishing House not only with a good quiet word.

Details

When: July 4, Saturday, 17:30-18:30
Where: Workshops of Culture, Grodzka 7 – patio
Admission free