Transfer czy osmoza? Literatura polska w angloamerykańskiej literaturze światowej
Transfer or Osmosis? Polish Literature and the Anglo-American World Literature

Summary/Abstract: The article addresses the problem of cultural transfer, first, by defining its conditions, and, secondly, by asking about the criteria by which we can measure its success. Among the latter, one can mention the impact of the translated work on the target language literature, the critical reception of the work, and on its author’s presence in the public space of the foreign culture. The successfully transferred work becomes an element of “world literature,” constituted differently in different cultures. The article discusses these issues by analyzing specific examples of translations of contemporary Polish literature into English and various forms of their presence in the Anglophone world. Special attention is paid not only to the influence these translations have on the literature of the target language, but also on the ways in which they are in turn affected by their new cultural and linguistic environment. Cultural transfer is thus seen as a process of multidirectional osmosis, in effect of which both the translated work and foreign literature are modified.

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