ACCORDING TO HER, BY MACIEJ HEN
Holland House proudly presents According to Her, by Maciej Hen, which has been shortlisted for the EBRD Prize:
ABOUT THE BOOK:
A book-length interview with the Mother of God. No questions, just answers. Mariamne is an old Jewish peasant woman from Galilee. She is visited by a young Greek man who came to see her to talk about her late son. Mariamne spins her story in a colourful and blunt language of a simple, old woman of natural intelligence and dry sense of humour.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Maciej Hen was born in 1955 in Warsaw. He graduated from the Cinematography Department at the Film School in Lodz. For years he has been active in cinematography, scriptwriting, still photography, directing of documentary films, translating from English, all fields of journalism (including photojournalism), television lighting design, music and sometimes even acting.
His first novel was Według niej (According to Her) published under a pen name Maciej Nawariak. In 2015 he published his second novel, Solfatara, which won numerous awards: the Book of the Year 2015 of the Warsaw Literary Premiere, the 2016 Gombrowicz Prize and was shortlisted to the 2016 Norwid Prize and the 2016 Angelus Prize. His third novel, Deutsch dla średnio zaawansowanych (Deutsch for Intermediates; Wydawnictwo Literackie) appeared in 2019. In 2021 he published his non-fiction book, Beatlesi w Polsce (The Beatles in Poland), half reportage, half essay.
Hen is currently working on an epistolographic historical novel Dni z Kallimachem (Days with Callimachus).
ABOUT THE TRANSLATOR
Anna Blasiak is a poet and translator. She has translated over 40 books from English into Polish and some fiction and poetry from Polish into English. In addition to her book-length translations, her work has been published in Best European Fiction 2015, Asymptote, The Guardian, B O D Y Literature, Modern Poetry in Translation and York Literary Review. More: annablasiak.com.
WHAT OTHERS ARE SAYING:
“Mary’s tale has been written before…this version …is earthier and funnier, with a Mary who is down-to-earth, gossipy and insightful. …Her character is drawn with such skill that, as the end comes, we suffer with her.”
– Antonia Senior, The Times
Available from Holland House Books, Amazon, Waterstones, Hive and Wordery and all good bookshops.
