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The page of Herling-Grudziński, Gustaw, English biography

Image of Herling-Grudziński, Gustaw
Herling-Grudziński, Gustaw
(1919–2000)

Biography

Gustaw Herling-Grudziński (May 20, 1919 Kielce, Poland - July 4, 2000 Naples, Italy) was one of the greatest Polish essayists and thinkers. He is best known for writing a personal account of life in the Soviet gulag - A World Apart.
He was born in Kielce into a Jewish family. His studies of Polish literature at Warsaw University were interrupted by the outbreak of the Second World War. During the Fall of 1939 he co-founded an underground resistance organization "Polska Ludowa Akcja Niepodległościowa, PLAN". As the organization’s courier he traveled to then Soviet occupied Lvov, but was arrested in March 1940 by the NKVD and sentenced on fabricated espionage charges. Imprisoned in Vitsebsk and a gulag in Arkhangelsk region for 2 years, he was released in 1942 under the Sikorski-Mayski Agreement. He joined Gen. Wladyslaw Anders' Army (Polish II Corps) and later fought in Italy at Monte Cassino. For his valor in combat he has been decorated with the Virtuti Militari cross, Poland's highest military decoration.
In 1947 he co-founded and initially co-edited the political and cultural magazine Kultura, then published in Rome. When the magazine moved to Paris he settled first in London and finally in Naples, Italy.
He was the winner of many literary prizes: Kultura (1958), Jurzykowski (1964), Kościelskis (1966), The News (1981), the Italian Premio Viareggio prize, the international Prix Gutenberg, and French Pen-Club. In 1998 he was awarded the Order of the White Eagle.
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