Anna Maria Mickiewicz
my history
Anna Maria Mickiewicz
is a Polish-born poet, writer, editor, publisher, and foreign correspondent who writes both in Polish and in English. Founder of the Literary Waves publishing house. Anna moved to California, and then to London, where she has lived for many years. She edits the annual literary magazine Pamiętnik Literacki (The Literary Memoir), London, and Contemporary Writers of Poland (USA), and is a member of the English Pen.
She received her Master of Arts degree from Maria Skłodowska-Curie University in Poland. She also obtained a certificate in Media Studies from Birkbeck College. As a student, she was involved in the democratic and civil rights movement in Poland in the Eighties. She was one of the editors of the civil rights independent magazine Wywrotowiec (The Rebel). After moving to England, she worked as a London correspondent covering literary and cultural issues for the Polish press and radio, in Poland, the USA and in the UK.
Her first collection of verse was published in 1985. Since then, her publications include short stories and essays Okruchy z Okrągłego Stołu (Breadcrumbs from the Round Table) in 2000, Londyńskie bagaże literackie in 2019, and verse collections Proscenium in 2010, London Manuscript, published by Poetry Space, Bristol, in 2014 and The Mystery of Time, published by Flutter Press, USA 2019. She has published an anthology with Danuta Błaszak, Flying Between Words, Contemporary Writers of Poland (Florida: 2015).
Her poetic works have appeared in the following journals in the United States, UK, Australia, Canada, Poland, Mexico, Bulgaria, Salvador, Hungary: Akant, Poezja Dzisiaj, Tygiel, Galeria, Pamiętnik Literacki, South Bank Poetry (UK), Kritya, The Exiled Ink (UK), The Screech Owl (UK), Syndic Literary Journal (CA), Lost Coast Review (CA). Together with Tomasz Mickiewicz, she published the book Secret Love Letters – Poland 1982 at Palewell Press, London 2021.
Anna Maria Mickiewicz is a member of the Jury of the Literary Award in India K M Anthru International Literature Prize for comprehensive contribution to literature.
She has also translated British and American poetry and drama. She has also published a review in an Australian anthology titled Jeden dzień. Polska, jaką pamiętam (Favoryta Publishing House 2014, Australia). She performed at the Penzance Literary Festival in 2013, and organised European Poetry Dialogues events to celebrate UNESCO’s World Poetry Day in 2014. Anna has contributed to literary academic research and publications. Her poetry featured on the radio in the UK (Poets Anonymous), Australia and Poland.
For many years she was a member of the Board of the Union of Polish Writers Abroad. She cooperated with many organizations, including with the British TV Channel 4 and Institute of Public Affairs in Warsaw. Together with the British translator of Polish literature, Noel Clarke, she took part in the creation of the exhibition Eagle and Lion, which was presented during the official visit of Queen Elizabeth II to Poland. In 2013, together with dr. Urszula Chowaniec, at the University College London School of Slavonic and East European Studies, she organized the World Premiere of World Poetry Day – European Literary Dialogues, which took place as part of the seminar meetings:
e Migration Landscapes Seminars on contemporary emigration & its literary and artistic representations. Anna won the Miasto Literatów (The City of Writers) Author of the Year in 2013 (http://www.miastoliteratow.com).
Anna has been awarded the Gloria Artis medal for Merit to Culture by the Polish Ministry of Culture, the Cross of Freedom and Solidarity and The Joseph Conrad Literary Prize (USA).
Cross of Freedom and Solidarity
In 2022, as part of the 3rd International Day of Polish Diaspora Education, organized by the Polish Academy of Social Sciences and Humanities in London (est. 2020), in the Competition for the Polish Artist of the Year entitled „Creators of feelings and imagination”, the jury of the quarterly „YPSILON” literary magazine (supported by the Benjamin Franklin Foundation), awarded the Poetry Award to Anna Maria Mickiewicz – for “creating and keeping moments in miniatures and metaphors of emotions, walking along the poetic streets of emigration”.