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The Art of Translation with Antonia Lloyd-Jones The Art of Translation with Antonia Lloyd-Jones
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The Art of Translation with Antonia Lloyd-Jones

The Valdemar Questionnaire
Ernest Valdemar
Reading
time 4 minutes
Ernest Valdemar:

is the well-known compiler of the “Bibliotheca Forensica” and author (under the nom de plume of Issachar Marx) of the Polish versions of Schiller’s “Wallenstein” and Rabelais’s “Gargantua”. A resident of Harlem, New York since 1839. A fictional character in one of Edgar Allan Poe’s stories, and a very real patron saint of “Przekrój”’s translators’ questionnaire.

In the Valdemar Questionnaire, we give voice to translators who reflect on their work and role as intermediaries between languages and cultures. In the first instalment of our series, the award-winning translator Antonia Lloyd-Jones takes on Valdemar.

The art of translation is very much about mediating between two very different realities… a task that at times can seem hardly negotiable. This was certainly the case for M. Ernest Valdemar – a fictional character in one of Edgar Allan Poe’s short stories –

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Ernest Valdemar:

is the well-known compiler of the “Bibliotheca Forensica” and author (under the nom de plume of Issachar Marx) of the Polish versions of Schiller’s “Wallenstein” and Rabelais’s “Gargantua”. A resident of Harlem, New York since 1839. A fictional character in one of Edgar Allan Poe’s stories, and a very real patron saint of “Przekrój”’s translators’ questionnaire.

Publish date: 05.06.2019

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Mrs Mohr Goes Missing Mrs Mohr Goes Missing
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Kraków Cloth Hall Sukiennice, northern side during renovation. Photo by Ignacy Krieger, 1879, from National Museum in Warsaw archives
Fiction

Mrs Mohr Goes Missing

Maryla Szymiczkowa
Maryla Szymiczkowa:
is the author of several crime novels set in fin de siècle Kraków. She was called into existence by the poet and writer Jacek Dehnel (born 1980) and translator Piotr Tarczyński (born 1983). Had she lived, she would have lived in Kraków with her professor husband, who – to our delight – would have been a subscriber to the hardcover edition of “Przekrój”.

Mrs Mohr Goes Missing is a crime novel set in Cracow in 1893. Full of period details and real historical facts, it’s the first in a series featuring Zofia Turbotyńska, the bored wife of a medical professor. Her efforts to advance her social position by getting involved in charitable fund-raising soon lead her to a much more exciting hobby: solving murders. In this, she is ably supported by her quick-witted cook, Franciszka.

At this point in the story, a corpse has been discovered at Helcel House, the retirement home run by nuns where Zofia is pursuing her charitable aims. Not convinced that the death was entirely natural, she wants to find out if there’s a poison that could leave its victim looking rosy-cheeked. But she wants to do this piece of research without anyone – especially her husband, Ignacy – realizing why she’s so interested in lethal toxins. So she arranges a supper party, and includes among the guests a colleague of her husband’s, Dr Iwaniec, who happens to be a toxicologist. Other guests include Mrs Iwaniec, medical student Tadeusz Żeleński, Zofia’s cousin and social rival Józefa Dutkiewicz, and an uninspiring couple named Zaremba.

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