New Perspectives in Polish Culture: Personal Encounters, Public Affairs collects essays that examine the public-private dynamic as Polish culture-from the nineteenth century to the present day-interacts with the tensions, ambiguities, and idiosyncrasies of European modernity. The authors of these essays discuss Polish poetry, fiction, theatre, and literary and cultural theory. Writers and artists discussed in these essays range from Adam Mickiewicz and Joseph Conrad through Witold Gombrowicz, Miron Bia oszewski, Czes aw Mi osz, Zofia Na kowska, and Tadeusz Kantor to S awomir Mro ek, Tadeusz Ro ewicz, the poets of bruLion, and the latest dramatists, as well as many other authors active both in Poland itself and in the Polish diaspora.