New Eastern Europe - November-December 2017

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book, discusses how the Russian writers

and thinkers who were living in Warsaw

during the interwar period later impacted

Polish post-war émigrés. These writers

included Dmitry Filosofov, Zinaida Gip-

pius and Dmitry Merezhkovsky, who all

fled Russia in 1920 following the Bol-

shevik Revolution. Giedroyc was par-

ticularly influenced by Filosofov, who

was known for his publishing activities

and the discussion clubs organised in

his home. These were ideas replicated

by Giedroyc once he himself became an

émigré in Paris. Grochowska also rightly

mentions Aleksandr Herzen, who as an

émigré co-published a journal called

Kolokol (Bell) in London. Written in Rus-

sian and French, Kolokol became an in-

fluential publication. Its impact inspired

Giedroyc, as he confessed in a letter to

Juliusz Mieroszewski: “A journal pub-

lished abroad, free of compromises and

liberally-minded, edited for Russians and

by Russians, read by all ... and influenc-

ing the situation in Russia ... This is our

ambition – partially already achieved”.

The Russian translation of Grochow-

ska’s book and its publication in St Pe-

tersburg is an unquestionable tangible

trace of cultural diplomacy as it was un-

derstood by those who established Kultu-

ra. Józef Czapski would often say that

specific people and their engagement

in cultural matters are more important

for building good relations between na-

tions than hundreds of promotional ac-

tivities. In the case of this book, such a

person was certainly the former direc-

tor of the Polish Institute in St Peters-

burg – Natalia Bryżko-Zapór. The nu-

merous activities that she championed

during her tenure in St Petersburg can be

seen as an implementation of Giedroyc’s

belief in the creative power of language.

An extraordinary editor

As mentioned above, it was Giedroyc’s

wish that Kultura be shut down upon his

death. This decision is often explained by

the fact that Giedroyc never prepared a

successor. Or possibly it would be better

explained by the fact the editor had oth-

er plans? Maybe it was not the lack of a

suitable person to take over the leader-

ship of the magazine but rather his con-

viction that Kultura was a product of a

In her book, Grochowska

discusses how Russian

writers and thinkers who

were living in Warsaw

during the interwar period

later impacted Polish

post-war émigrés.

Eastern Café Cultural diplomacy at its best, Dorota Sieroń-Galusek