An Evening With the Author of ‘Witte Nachten’, Urszula Honek
This evening, Niña Weijers engages in a conversation with the Polish author Urszula Honek and her translator Charlotte Pothuizen. Honek is famous for her book Witte nachten (De Bezige Bij) or Biale Noce.
As a poet migrating towards prose, Honek retains her poetic discipline. Her afterimage-stories open up new perspectives, and often remain open-ended. Witte nachten is a saga about a place where the fates of humans, animals and the land intertwine in very specific ways. Each memory preserves different elements of the story, and everyone has their sovereign right to history. The book was longlisted by the International Booker Prize 2024 as „A highly artistic study of death encapsulated in moving stories set in Poland’s Beskid Mountains region”. Dutch author Niña Weijers will moderate the conversation between Urszula Honek and her translator Charlotte Pothuizen.
About this event
This event is part of the Liter[r]a series of literary events organized by the Olga Tokarczuk Foundation with the financial support of the Polish Ministry of Culture and National Heritage, part of the Promotion of Polish Culture Abroad 2025.
About the speakers
Urszula Honek (born 1987) has authored four poetry collections and the short story collection Białe noce (Witte nachten, De Bezige Bij 2025). The winner of the Grand Prix of the Rainer Maria Rilke Poetry Competition, the Kraków UNESCO City of Literature Award. Her debut book of prose, White Nights translated by Kate Webster was long-listed for the Booker Prize 2024. In 2023, she won both the Conrad Award and the Kościelski Award for the most promising Polish writer under 40.
Charlotte Pothuizen is one of the most prolific Dutch literary translators of Polish literature. She graduated in Polish Studies and Musicology (MA) from the University of Amsterdam and the University of Warsaw, and started her career in literary translation in 2006. Since 2017 she has been translating Polish literary works for Dutch-speaking readers on a full-time basis. She is the recipient of the Aleida Schot Award 2022 for translations of contemporary Polish literature.
Niña Weijers (moderator) studied literary theory in Amsterdam and Dublin. She has published short stories, essays and articles in e.g. Das Magazin, De Gids and De Revisor. Her debut novel De consequenties (2014) won the Anton Wachter Prize 2014 for best first novel, the Opzij Feminist Literature Prize, the Lucy B. & C.W. van der Hoogt Prize, and was shortlisted for the Libris Prize 2015 and the Golden Boekenuil 2015. Her collection of essays Zelf doen (2022) was short-listed for the Boekenbon Literatuurprijs 2022, while Cassandra (2023) earned her the E. du Perron Award.
