from 2 or 3 April 1934

Warsaw. Bruno Schulz spends a week in Warsaw in the company of Zofia Nałkowska.

At the beginning of April 1934, Schulz leaves for six days to Warsaw. The correspondence with Zenon Waśniewski*1 and Stanisław Ignacy Witkiewicz*2 shows that Schulz travelled between April 3 and 11. He spends most of his time in the company of Zofia Nałkowska*3. Together with her and her secretary (and soon a partner) Bogusław Kuczyński*, he attends the performance of Crime and Punishment directed and adapted by Leon Schiller at Teatr Polski, as well as a performance of Krasin at the Jewish Youth Theatre of Michał Weichert. He also participates in a meeting organized by Nałkowska for people from literary circles. “One of these days,” Nałkowska writes, “I invited a dozen people in the afternoon especially for Bruno – some of his enthusiasts: Błeszyński, Brucz, Wat, Czapski, Rudnicki, Boguszewska, Kornacki. There was also Karol Szymanowski, whose brother died recently, and Tarnowski, Irzykowski, Halinka and Gojawiczyńska (who also brings me praise, although generically more distant, like Choromański)”4. Apart from this meeting, on other occasions Schulz also meets other writers: Julian Tuwim*, Aleksander Wat*5, Adam Ważyk*, Stanisław Brucz and Pola Gojawiczyńska*6. 

Hanna Kirchner suspects that during Schulz’s visit to Warsaw his only sexual experience with Nałkowska may have occurred7. 

See also: 16 April 1933*, June 1933*, 11 July 1933*, August 1933*, 24 March 1934*, 2 April 1934*, 12 April 1934*, 5 June 1934*.

  • 1
    Letter by Bruno “Schulz to Zenon Waśniewski of 2 April 1934”, [in:] Bruno Schulz, Dzieła zebrane, tom 5: Księga listów, zebrał i przygotował do druku Jerzy Ficowski, uzupełnił Stanisław Danecki, Gdańsk 2016, p. 67.
  • 2
    “Letter by Bruno Schulz to Stanisław Ignacy Witkiewicz of 12 April 1934”, [in:] Bruno Schulz, op. cit., s. 104.
  • 3
    In a letter to Zenon Waśniewski of 24 March 1934 Schulz informs the addressee that he plans to stay in a Warsaw hall of residence for state teachers at Marszałkowska 4. The place (Marszałkowska 4) is in fact where Zofia Nałkowska lives. See: “Letter from Bruno Schulz to Zenon Waśniewski of 24 March 1934”, [in:] Bruno Schulz, op. cit., p. 66.
  • 4
    Zofia Nałkowska, Dzienniki IV: 1930–1939. Część 1 (1930–1934), opracowanie, wstęp i komentarz Hanna Kirchner, Warszawa 1988, p. 440–441.
  • 5
    In an undated letter to Maria Czapska from February 1962 to January 1963, Aleksander Wat writes that Schulz spoke to him of his fascination with “Piecyk”. “What you write about ambiguity and the style of Białoszewski is rather an unintentional return to my first book (1920) Ja z jednej strony i Ja z drugiej strony mego mopsożelaznego piecyka, unknown today, and in my time ridiculed. With the exception of Witkacy, who wrote an enthusiastic text about it (in Teatr), and Szulz [!] , who told me that it was one of his main sources, and Białoszewski, too...” (A. Wat, Pisma zebrane, tom 4: Korespondencja, część 1, wybrała, opracowała, przypisami i posłowiem opatrzyła Alina Kowalczykowa, Warszawa 2005, p. 66). He presents a similar recollection in his notebooks written at the turn of the fifties and sixties, “In the thirties Bruno Schulz told me that ‘Piecyk’ inspired him, without ‘Piecyk’ he would not have started writing (but maybe it was his usual flattering way of introducing himself to the ‘established’ penmen)” (Aleksander Wat, Notatniki, transkrypcja i opracowanie Adam Dziadek, Jan Zieliński, Warszawa 2015, p. 836). Whether Wat means the conversation from April 1934 is unknown. 
  • 6
    “Letter by Bruno Schulz to Zenon Waśniewski of 5 June 1934”, [in:] Bruno Schulz, op. cit., p. 70.
  • 7
    Hanna Kirchner, Nałkowska, albo życie pisane, Warszawa 2011, s. 406.