Władysław Reymont member of political party Polish People's Party "Piast"
Nobel Prize
In November 1924 he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature over rivals Thomas Mann, George Bernard Shaw and Thomas Hardy, after he had been nominated by Anders Österling, member of the Swedish Academy. Public opinion in Poland supported this recognition for Stefan Żeromski, but the prize went to the author of Chłopi. Żeromski was reportedly refused for his allegedly anti-German sentiments. However, Reymont could not take part in the award ceremony in Sweden due to a heart condition. The award and the check for 116,718 Swedish kronor were sent to Reymont in France, where he was being treated.
In 1925, somewhat recovered, he went to a farmers' meeting in Wierzchosławice near Kraków, where Wincenty Witos welcomed him as a member of the Polish People's Party "Piast" and praised his writing skills. Soon afterward, Reymont's health deteriorated. He died in Warsaw in December 1925 and was buried in the Powązki Cemetery. The urn holding his heart was laid in a pillar of the Holy Cross Church in Warsaw.
Reymont's literary output includes about 30 extensive volumes of prose. There are works of reportage: Pielgrzymka do Jasnej Góry (Pilgrimage to Jasna Góra) (1894), Z ziemi chełmskiej (From the Chełm Lands) (1910 – about the persecutions of the Uniates), Z konstytucyjnych dni (From the Days of the Constitution) (about the revolution of 1905). Also, there are some sketches from the collection Za frontem (Beyond the Front) (1919) and numerous short stories on life in the theatre and the village or on the railway: "Śmierć" ("Death") (1893), "Suka" ("Bitch") (1894), "Przy robocie" ("At Work") and "W porębie" ("In the Clearing") (1895), "Tomek Baran" (1897), "Sprawiedliwie" ("Justly") (1899) and a sketch for a novel Marzyciel (Dreamer) (1908). There are also novels: Komediantka, Fermenty, Ziemia obiecana, Chłopi, Wampir (The Vampire) (1911), which were sceptically received by the critics, and a trilogy written in the years 1911–1917: Rok 1794 (1794) (Ostatni Sejm Rzeczypospolitej, Nil desperandum and Insurekcja) (The Last Parliament of the Commonwealth, Nil desperandum and Insurrection).
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