Polish Library International Understanding and Cultural Policy in Publishing Practice

The Polnische Bibliothek, founded by the German Institute for Polish Culture in Darmstadt, financed by Robert Bosch Foundation and published by the Suhrkamp Publishing House, remains a unique attempt at presenting Polish literature in the German book market. This paper focuses on the historical, political and cultural background of the series and the conflicts at the backstage of its initiation. The analysis, based mostly on the so far unpublished archival correspondence of the publishing house has two aims: on the one hand, a historiographic description of the so far unknown processes of Polish literature transfer lies at its centre, on the other, it addresses the need for appropriate conceptualisations of such phenomena. The study is framed in the category of Histoire croisee in this case applied to an analysis of translation production. Activities of all the actors involved, the conflicts and solutions to them constitute the starting point. These generate an argumentation space which offers insights into the history of production of the series that had since its beginning been marked by conflicting expectations.