Olga Drenda
Writer, journalist, translator, and cultural anthropologist. She comes from Mikołów. With equal ease, she writes about love, DIY projects, or cats, although she is perhaps best known as a tireless explorer of the “little era” (as she calls it herself), which separates the communist state from contemporary Poland. As a researcher – curious and meticulous – she excels in navigating the world of social media.
Nominated for “Polityka’s Passports,” winner of the Gdynia Literary Award 2019.
Above all, an experience of a compact city. It is commonly associated with a city of heritage, but within this heritage, entirely contemporary life continues, and its residents are not exhibits. It’s precisely this aspect that interests me: interpreting heritage and local identity in one’s own way, so as to integrate it into the everyday life of a modern farmer, artisan, artist, or entrepreneur, and thereby constantly enliven it. How not to become permanently stuck in a fairytale – that’s the challenge that, as I imagine, Pszczyna faces all the time. At the same time, cohesion, compactness, and the “pocket-sized” character help create a small ecosystem in which one can nurture a good, contemporary life.