BEREŚ Stanisław

Born on 4 May 1950 in Wroclaw; son of Józef Bereś and Wanda, née Czuchajewska. He attended Grammar School No. 2 in Wroclaw from 1964, completing his advanced secondary education in 1968. He studied at the Department of Irrigation at the Higher School of Agriculture in Wroclaw (Akademia Rolnicza – now the Wroclaw University of Environmental and Life Sciences. He subsequently began a degree in Polish Studies at the University of Wroclaw (UWr). He started writing poetry in 1970, later publishing poems from the period in the collection Wybór niezobowiązujący (An optional selection, 1983). He also studied cultural studies in the two-year Studium Kulturalno-Oświatowe (Cultural-educational programme) in 1972/73. He was awarded a master's degree from UWr in 1973 and was appointed teaching assistant. From 1976 he was senior assistant lecturer at the Institute of Polish Philology (IFP – Instytut Filologii Polskiej). He published his first article in 1974, Problemy komunikatywności i metaforyczności nagłówków prasowych na przykładzie „Słowa Polskiego”. Próba klasyfikacji błędów (Issues of communicativeness and metaphors in headlines – towards a classification of errors. A case study of "Słowo Polskie"). This linguistic study appeared in "Wrocławski Rocznik Prasoznawczy 1974". He has gone on to publish numerous pieces of research and literary criticism, particularly on the literature of the interwar period, the Second World War and occupation era, as well as the postwar period. His academic studies have appeared in "Literatura Ludowa" (intermittently between 1975-80), "Pamiętnik Literacki” (1978, 1981-84 and 1988) and "Acta Universitatis Wratislaviensis" (1981, 1983, 1986-87, 1990, and 1997). He published reviews, sketches and interviews in periodicals including "Nadodrze" (1976-77) and "Odra" (intermittently between 1976-90, including a cycle of interviews with Stanisław Lem, "Rozmowy ze Stanisławem Lemem", that appered between 1984 and 1985). He has been a member of "Odra's" editorial board since 1987. He has also written for "Twórczość" (intermittently between 1976 and 1989), "Miesięcznik Literacki" (1977-82) and "Integracje" (1979-81). His articles also appeared in unofficial periodicals published outside the system of state censorship: "Z Dnia na Dzień" (from 1980; using the by-line sb), "Solidarność Dolnośląska" (1981), "Afront" (1982; using the by-line I.C.M.) and "Obecność" (1983, as bes). While conducting research towards his doctoral thesis on the Vilnius-based group of poets Żagary he recorded interviews with its former members Czesław Miłosz, Jerzy Putrament, Aleksander Rymkiewicz and Jerzy Zagórski. They remain unpublished. In subsequent years, he continued to conduct interviews with leading figures in Polish literature. These materials did appear in print in books and magazines. Between 1979 and 1982 he was director of the Institute for West European and North American Studies (Instytut Badań Europy Zachodniej i Ameryki Północnej) at UWr. He was awarded a doctoral degree from the University of Wroclaw in 1982 for his thesis Poezja żagarystów do roku 1945 (The poetry of the Żagary group to 1945), which was supervised by Prof. Janusz Degler. He was subsequently made lecturer at the Institute for Polish Studies at UWr. Until 1987 Bereś also lectured at the Wrocław branch of the Krakow-based State Theatre School (PWST – Państwowa Wyższa Szkoła Teatralna) Between 1986-87, he led the thematic research group "Modele literatury fantastyczno-naukowej" (Models of science-fictions literature) within the broader Problem Węzłowy 11.1 (or "Key question", a structure within the state-funded research system in communist Poland). He left for France in 1987, where he lectured at Université Charles de Gaulle Lille III. He developed a programme in Polish studies for French students. He also acted as a reviewer of master's and doctoral dissertations on Polish literature and culture. Bereś likewise made programmes for Radio France Nord. He was awarded a habilitation degree in 1989 for his study Uwięziony w śmierci. O twórczości Tadeusza Gajcego (Bound by death. The work of Tadeusz Gajcy). A year later he was made senior lecturer at UWr. In 1993, he co-founded and implemented a pilot programme in multimedia teaching (Service d’Enseignement à Distance de l’Université Charles de Gaulle), preparing seventeen multimedia lectures for it. He remained active as a literary critic and poet, publishing mainly in the émigré periodicals "Aneks" (London, 1988; using the by-line Stanisław Nowicki), "Kultura", (Paris, 1988-90; also as Stanisław Nowicki), "Nowy Dziennik" and its supplement "Przegląd Polski", (New York, 1989-90; as Stanisław Karłowicki), "Puls" (London, 1989-90; as Stanisław Nowicki), "Zeszyty Historyczne" (Paris, 1988; as Stanisław Nowicki) and "Kontakt" (Paris, 1990; as Stanisław Nowicki). He also wrote for the Wroclaw-based "Odra" (1992-2001, including the cycle of poemsListy z podziemia, [Letters from the Underground]; also as Stanisław Nowicki). He was a member of the periodical's editorial board to 2003. In 1993 he returned to IFP at the University of Wroclaw, where he was made associate professor. He was a member of the University's Senate Commission for Academic Affairs from 1994 to 1996 and a member of the Polish Academy of Sciences' Commission of Literary History (Komisja Historyczno-Literacka PAN) between 1997 and 1999. He was made a member of the Polish PEN Club in 1996. He served on the jury of Poland’s prestigious Nike Literary Prize between 1996 and 2004. In 1997 he joined the French-Belgian-British-German editorial committee of the series Lettres Européennes. He was made full professor in 1998. During this period, he published in "Fraza" (2000-01 and 2005), "Kresy" (intermittently between 2000 and 2005), "Gazeta Wyborcza" (intermittently between 2001 and 2003, and again between 2005 and 2008) and in "Dziennik. Polska-Europa-Świat" from 2006 (where, among other things, he published numerous interviews). He also collaborated with Polish Television(TVP). Between 1996 and 2010 he presented the literary show Telewizyjne Wiadomości Literackie (which began as a bi-weekly show on the foreign service TVP Polonia before being broadcast monthly on the national station TVP 2). The interviews that he conducted formed the book Historia literatury polskiej w rozmowach XX i XXI w. (A history of Polish literature in conversations from the 20th and 21st centuries, 2002). In 1997/98, he presented Latarnik, a cultural show on TVP Polonia showcasing the cultural and scientific activities of Poles abroad. In 2003 he presented the current affairs show Jatka Kulturalna (three episodes on TVP 3). He was also a member of the Programming Council of TVP 3 between 2001 and 2003. He also directed documentary films for TVP 2, including one on Wojciech Dąbrowski titled Biały brat Papuasów (The Papuans' white brother), one on young publishers titled Wydaj to sam (PIY – Publish it yourself), and one on the sculptor Igor Mitoraj titled Ciało kamienia (Body of stone). In 2002, he was appointed full professor at the University of Wroclaw. The same year, he started lecturing at the Chair of Journalism and Social Communication (Katedra Dziennikarstwa i Komunikacji Społecznej) at the University. When the Chair was made into an Institute in 2004, he became director of the Centre for Writing and Film (currently the Centre for Literary and Documentary Forms – Zakład Form Literackich i Dokumentalnych). He was awarded the University of Wroclaw's Rector's Prize on many occasions (1993, 1999, 2000, 2003, 2004 and 2006). Between 2006 and 2016 he was a member of the jury of the Angelus Central European Literary Award (Literacka Nagroda Europy Środkowej Angelus). In 2007/08, he conducted Magiel Literacki, a series of discussions with writers at the Polski Theatre in Wroclaw. He served as a member of the Programme Council of the Congress of Polish Culture in 2009. In 2012 he served as editor of the online literary portal telewizjaliteracka.pl, which was an extension of the television programme Telewizyjne Wiadomości Literackie. In 2013 he became editor-in-chief of Biblioteka Narodowa, the prestigious series of critical editions of literary works. Until 2015 he was a member of the Programme Council of Wrocław 2016 – European Capital of Culture.
Some time around 1980 he married the actress Monika Braun. They subsequently divorced. He lives in Wroclaw.