THE POLKA: What’s Riveting in Polish Literature. Impressions of Enfield Poets’ Literary Festival by M. Anne Alexander
This month we have another guest post in The Polka series. Poet M. Anne Alexander sums up the event at Enfield Poets’ Literary Festival a couple of weeks ago, which had a very strong Polish flavour and where the Polish language sounded strongly among the other languages represented.
By Anna Blasiak
Events organized by Anna Maria Mickiewicz’s London-based publishing house, Literary Waves and by the Polish Cultural Institute. Saturday, 26th September 2026. Forty Hall, Enfield.
A warm, welcoming, bright autumnal day. A wedding couple passes by. The gardens are busy with well-wishers, walkers and visitors to the literary festival.
A Presentation of Polish and International Poets
The Parlour. Oak boards. Windows, bright with inviting light. White sculptured walls and ceiling. An architectural gem. A gathering, all at home here, though having come from around the world.
Anthony Smith engaged and welcomed us, followed by the accomplished poet and translator Anna Maria Mickiewicz, who has published most of the poetry heard today.
I read from Waterways, exploring the potential of local rivers. The psychological subtlety of Manon Godet’s reading, mostly in English, with some French, touched us all. Anna Blasiak concluded the first half with her wry reading. Her astonishing achievements, and her kindness in promoting this event on behalf of the Polish Cultural Institute in London, were much appreciated.
The talented singing of Jessie Pye led us to a refreshment interval, where everyone opened up in appreciation of the extraordinary connections ringing through this event.
Could anyone have predicted or intended the characteristic tenderness, transmuting brutal wars and politics, carried by gentle humour and blended with irony in this place?
Steve Rushton’s re-invention of Ovid in The Myrtle Tree led us to laugh, as intended, at the presentation of a man acting like a selfish god. Otherwise, throughout this event, love was presented as tender and true.
The prodigious Polish writers Wojciech Bonowicz and Eliza Anna Falkiewicz followed. Eliza’s Inter Mundos sums up the experience of being pulled between belonging to her homeland in Poland and her family life in Australia, as well as her attachment to this country.
Wars and politics can separate lovers from homelands. This felt cruel. Yet love seemed to transmute anger and bitterness into something precious.
Heartrending choices had had to be made between lovers and homelands, and re-wrought into something good. This reminded me of Chopin, playing the piano in fashionable Paris, his music ringing with the Polish songs and dances of his homeland, forever in his thoughts.
Another theme emerged: finding, here in London, links between families from generations past, like Kenneth Bone, poet, former student of politics at the LSE and teacher, descended from a refugee, nephew of the famous poet Adam Mickiewicz, and, of course, related to Tomasz Mickiewicz, here now.
The theme of exile continued with the work of David Clark, an editor of Exiled Ink, devoted to works by refugee writers in the UK.
Personally, I was touched to realise how many of my family had lived and worked close to where Anna and Tomasz are living now, among their friends, in North London. Besides global connections, North London roots run deep among this group of friends. We concluded with poetry by the widely acknowledged London/Irish poet Mary Duggan, and her poignant lyrical rendering of Yeats’ Down by the Salley Gardens.
Something wonderful happened here today. I cannot fully comprehend, explain, or express it. However, I am very grateful to have been invited, and I wish the very best of futures to everyone whom I met here today.
By M. Anne Alexander
M. Anne Alexander is a widely published poet, mainly associated with Enfield Poets and their Literary Festival at Forty Hall. Her background is as a music teacher, a lecturer in English and a Hardy Scholar. Her Waterways pamphlet was inspired by Enfield’s rivers.
Read previous posts in The Polka series:
THE POLKA: What’s Riveting in Polish Literature by Anna Blasiak. WE HAVE NEWS!
THE POLKA: What’s Riveting in Polish Literature by Anna Blasiak. FOUND IN TRANSLATIONS AWARDS
THE POLKA: What’s Riveting in Polish Literature by Anna Blasiak. The Chameleon that is DANIEL ODIJA
THE POLKA: What’s Riveting in Polish Literature by Anna Blasiak. MAŁGORZATA LEBDA has it all
THE POLKA: What’s Riveting in Polish Literature by Anna Blasiak. JOANNA BATOR and her bears
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