Bruno Shulz

 I heard about this author in a podcast. Thought worth finding out more about him.

Shulz was a twentieth century writer from small town called Dragobych in Poland. Now this town is located in Ukraine.  A jewish writer in the world war era - from Poland. You do the math. Yes, he was brutally shot by a Nazi officer in November 1942 at the age of 40.

Shulz was born to a middle class Jewish family. Father was a shop keeper and mother was a house wife. 

He studied architecture for a short period of time. Then he started teaching art in a school in his home town. 

According to one of his students, he was very shy and timid, lacking any form of self confidence. Knowing that he will be surely bullied by students, he adopted story telling in class. Made of mythological stories, which completely engrossed the students and kept Shulz out of trouble from these young ruffians. 

In his free time, he would draw. But his literary interest, he kept hidden from the world. 

Self portrait by Bruno Shulz

 He started sending a little accounts of his life and his family members as a post script in the letters to his friends. When these letters were brought to the notice of writer Zofia Nalkowska, she compelled his to publish his stories. So his first book 'The cinnamon shops' was published in 1931. (Its English translation is called the Crocodile street).

Three years later, this book was followed by another short stories collection called 'The sanatorium under the hour glass'. 

When in 1939, Poland and Dragobych was occupied by Nazi Germany, he was sent to a ghetto along with other Jews. Before going, he is said to have given his works to a friend for safe keeping. But the identity of this friend is unknown, and these works were never recovered.

In the ghetto, Bruno had a patron, a Nazi officer called Felix Landau who like Bruno's paintings and commissioned him to paint murals on his children's' nursery.  But on November 1942, while he was returning home after buying a loaf of bread, he was shot dead supposedly by a rival Nazi officer as a revenge against Felix.

Infanta and her dwarves

 

At the time, Bruno was supposedly writing another book called ' The messiah' which was never found. 

Bruno was not a prolific writer and many of his works are lost. Many of his stories are autobiographical. His writing style is fantastic realism or surreal, some what similar to that of Franz Kafka. 

In fact, Bruno helped his fiancee to translate the book 'The trial' by Kafka into Polish.

 

 Reference:

Bruno Shulz : Wikipedia page 

His art collection in wikiarts

Book by Bruno in Librivox in Polish