“I am very happy that you, young people, reach for fairy tales that teach you something,” Ryszard Adam Gruchawka said on 16 November in the packed Orzeł cinema hall. That day, young fans of the renowned fairy-tale writer surprised him in a very special way. They performed two mini-plays based on the texts of the lumberjack from Stara Oleszna.
“Each of us feels like a kid in our own way, but we do not admit it,” said the main subject of the afternoon meeting. Ryszard Adam Gruchawka wrote his first text at the age of 13. It was a fairy tale entitled “The Condemned”. Since then, several hundred fairy tales, numerous poems and stories, and even several plays have been created. The artist has already published 10 books. But he has material for at least 5 more in his drawers. Asked about his sources of inspiration, the fairy-tale writer replied that even a walk in the forest can be a source of inspiration. And sometimes all it takes is simply opening a window.
“He has great talent, which cannot be acquired at universities. It is simply a gift from God,” Józefa Witas, owner of the Agora bookshop and someone who has promoted the artist’s work for many years, says about Gruchawka. Józefa Witas first encountered Gruchawka’s texts in the 1980s. At that time, the owner of Agora was impressed by a story about a lumberjack written in the style of Jack London. But it is not the case that Józefa Witas values only the prose of the fairy-tale writer from Stara Oleszna. “His work for children is also wonderful,” she admits. “Many fairy tales deserve wider promotion.”
“I am fascinated by the punchlines of his texts—the discovery of a soul in various objects,” explains Krystyna Raszka, a Polish teacher and longtime promoter of the lumberjack’s work. In Raszka’s opinion, what demonstrates the uniqueness of Gruchawka’s texts is his sensitivity to the beauty of the Polish language and his way of perceiving the world, a way characteristic of exceptionally sensitive people. That is why the Polish teacher regrets that the artist is still so little known in Poland. “We want to make it so that one day Gruchawka will stand alongside Brzechwa and Tuwim,” Krystyna Raszka points out.
The artist’s latest work is entitled “The Lumberjack’s Fairy Tales”. It is the first book published by Warsaw-based Ex Libris. Another one is due to appear soon—the prose work “The Emigrant’s Shoes”. The largely autobiographical text tells of Gruchawka’s stay in Ireland. “The book debunks the myth of easy money in Ireland. It shows narrow-mindedness, provincialism and delusion. Just as the Germans had their Volksdeutsche, the Irish have their little Poles,” Gruchawka explains. The publisher has high hopes for the work. “We intend to submit this book for the Nike Award,” says Katarzyna Jaroń, a representative of the Warsaw publishing house.
(GA information)