VietNamNet Bridge – The first-ever poetry collection by late Polish poet Wislawa Szymborska-Wlodek, who won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1996, has just been released in Ha Noi.

Nobel prize winning poet Wislawa Szymborska-Wlodek, whose collection has just been published in Viet Nam for the first time. — Photo urbanlifeinlondon.files.wordpress.com

The collection, which was published by the Viet Nam Writers' Association Publishing House, translated 119 poems into Vietnamese by Ta Minh Chau from the Polish language.

Szymborska (1923 – 2012) was a poet, essayist and translator. She was described as the "Mozart of Poetry."

Szymborska was awarded the Nobel Prize "for poetry that with ironic precision allows the historical and biological context to come to light in fragments of human reality."

Her work has been translated into English and many European languages, as well as into Arabic, Hebrew, Japanese and Chinese.

In Viet Nam, her poems have been published in various literature publications, yet this is the first time a collection by her has been introduced.

"All of her works contain a common message: the beauty of life overwhelms every corner, every time, even in the simplest things," poet Nguyen Quang Thieu, Vice Chairman of Viet Nam Writers' Association said.

"Through that, we understand a great artiste's attitude toward her responsibility in social reality," Thieu added.

Poet, translator Ta Minh Chau spent a long time studying and working in Poland, where he had met Szymborska several times.

He said though the poet had never been to Viet Nam, she wrote on the wars in the country in two poems namely "The Shied" and "Viet Nam."

The poems help people around the world get a better understanding on the just revolutions of the Vietnamese people, and the virtuosity of the people in general, and Vietnamese women in particular, he commented.

Michal Rusinek, Chairman of Wislawa Szymborska Foundation, who joined the book release ceremony here on Wednesday, said he had accompanied her only for a part of her life as she always worked alone.

"She led a simple life," the former secretary of the great poet said.

She donated the entire US$1 million she received from the Nobel Prize committee to the foundation. Now the foundation awards the best international poetry collection translated into Polish. The prize reaches $70,000.

VNS/VNN