The End and the Beginning

“The End and the Beginning,” or “Koniec i poczatek” as titled in the original Polish, was written by the Nobel Prize-winning poet Wisława Szymborska. “The End and the Beginning” was published in 1993 in Szymborska’s collection of poetry of the same name, and details how the horrors of war are amplified in the aftermath of the conflict. Translators Clare Cavanagh and Stanislaw Baranczak first translated the poem from Polish into English for Szymborska’s Poems: New and Collected (1998). However, the most recent English translation of “The End and the Beginning” was written by Joanna Trzeciak, appearing in Szymborska’s 2001 collection, Miracle Fair. Szymborska’s poetry is rarely sentimental, and instead, favors irony and wit, examining deceptively simple domestic scenes in order to explicate their larger, societal truths.

Szymborska’s poetry is rife with social and political commentary, centering around the lives of everyday citizens. “The End and the Beginning” serves as a prime example of Szymborska’s fixation with the domestic, shedding light on the traumas experienced by post-war populations. The Polish history of World War II into the age of Stalinism was another major influence on Szymborska’s work (see: Contextual Analysis “Historical Context”), as it was World War II that halted her education as a young adult, entirely altering the landscape of her everyday life.