Christophe Jeżewski
Christophe Jezewski, in Polish Krzysztof Andrzej Jeżewski (born 24 April 1939) is a poet, musicologist, essayist and translator of Polish descent who has been living in France since 1970. Biography. Christophe Jeżewski was born in Warsaw, in a Francophone family of humanistic tradition. His maternal grandfather Adam Czartkowski, a scientist and historian of culture, was the author of monographs on Chopin and Beethoven; His father was an anglicist and economist, and his mother Zofia Jeżewska - a writer, journalist, and art critic was also the author of four books on Chopin. At an early age, he developed a passion  for translation, which he considered as a bridge between cultures and peoples. At the age of sixteen, he translated the "Chantefables et Chantefleurs" by Robert Desnos. Later, while studying the Romance languages at the Warsaw University, he became one of the most active translators of French poetry (Segalen, Oscar Venceslas de Lubicz-Milosz, Michaux, René Char, Jean Follain, the surrealists, Eugène Guillevic, etc.) and Hispano-American. He introduced the Poles to some poetic geniuses of this continent: Jorge Luis Borges, José Gorostiza, Octavio Paz. At the same time, he continued his poetic work (beginning in 1968 in the magazine "Poezja ) and was a musical critic. He also began to translate Polish poetry into French, in particular Cyprian Norwid (1821–1883), the father of Polish modern poetry and great Christian thinker of whom John Paul II claimed inspiration. In 1963 he completed his studies of Romance philology at the Warsaw University. In 1970, the political climate in Poland had become unbearable because of the wave of red fascism", and he left thanks to a French government scholarship and settled permanently in France. From 1971 to 1973, he collaborated with the Polish staff for the ORTF which broadcast his 65 portraits of the  most prominent French poets of the twentieth. In 1976 he obtained his degree of Polish literature at the Paris-Sorbonne University and married Maria Thelma Noval, a painter, poet and sociologist from Philippines, of whom he had two children. Since 1978, he has made several stays in the Philippines. Since 1974, he continues in France an intense activity as a translator of Polish literature, makes discover among others Cyprian Norwid, Witold Gombrowicz, Bruno Schulz, , Czesław Miłosz (Nobel Prize in Literature 1980), Krzysztof Kamil Baczyński, Wisława Szymborska (Nobel Prize in Literature 1996) and composers Karol Szymanowski, Stanisław Moniuszko, Mieczysław Karłowicz. He  collaborates with the Polish emigre press and the French music press, organizes "poetry and music" evenings and gives lectures on Polish culture and music. After the Martial law in Poland was established on 13 December 1981, he had in France a vast activity of information and propagation of the democratic and Christian ideas of Solidarność. In 1984 he left Paris and settled with his family in Noisy-le-Grand where he lived until now. In autumn 1989 he obtained French nationality. A specialist of Cyprian Norwid, he has been president of the "Les Amis de C. K. Norwid" Parisian association  since 2003. Publications. Other. He also translated into Polish many French poets of the 20th century, notably Victor Segalen, Oscar Milosz, Henri Michaux and René Char, as well as authors from other languages such as Octavio Paz, José Gorostiza, Jorge Luis Borges, Kathleen Raine, Angelus Silesius and Maya Noval.