Drohobych. Bruno Schulz writes a letter to Zenon Waśniewski, the editor of Kamena, and asks for his opinion on the Second Autumn sent a few days earlier. He also shares his impressions about his painting works, which he saw in Truskavets during his recent stay.
Uncertain about the fate of the parcel for Kamena* – sent, which he emphasises, by registered mail – and about the value of his literary work, Schulz begins by asking: “I am very curious if you and Mr. Jaworski liked the piece and if it will be published. It seems it is too long and will have to go in 2 issues”. A similar question will appear at the end of the letter (“I am very curious how you would rate my piece for Kamena. The idea is a bit risky and I do not know if I have managed to reflect the quintessence of autumn, which this ‘meteorological treaty’ is supposed to do”).
He devoted a part of the letter to his efforts to obtain “an annual leave to write a novel”. He thinks with horror about the prospect of refusal: “It will be a real despair, because I have become so used to holidays from school and brats that I am completely unable to cope with them and they are getting to me”.
The letter ends with opinions on “all paintings” by Waśniewski, promised in the correspondence from September 30, which Schulz saw at the Aleksander Leszczyc* gallery in Truskavets a few days earlier. “I liked them very much”, he writes. “These green park bunches, greenery lit by gaps in the sky are an intérieur so harmonised with colours”. The following words refer as much to the paintings as to the technique used by Waśniewski: “I always thought that tempera is a more noble technique than oil painting. This technique is less realistic, cooler and more refined. But the difficulties are also incomparably greater: the inability to mix and fuse tones, the need for surface treatment and the lightening after drying. But the colours have something of a velvety-tapestry nature. Do you also do figural things? You have achieved real mastery in this technique”. (sr) (transl. mw)
See also: March 15, 1934, March 24, 1934, April 2, 193[4], April 24, 1934, June 5, 1934, June 23, 1934, August 28, 1934, September 14, 1934, September 30, 1934, October 15, 1934, November 7, 1934, November 15, 1934, December 19, 1934, January 28, 1935, March 16, 1935, [March 25, 1935], June 24, 1935, July 13, 1935, August 3, 1935, [August 7, 1935], June 2, 1937, August 4, 1937, [5 January 1938], April 24, 1938. (bt) (transl. mw)
