Academic farewell to Profesor Florian Śmieja
We are honoured to invite you to the academic farewell ceremony of Profesor Florian Śmieja (1925-2019) – doctor honoris causa of University of Wrocław decorated with “Cruz de Encomienda de la Orden de Isabella Católica” by king of Spain, Felipe VI – together with the ceremony of granting his name to the lecture room 4.1 in the Institute of Romance studies at the University of Wrocław.
The ceremony will take place on 12th September 2023 (Tuesday) in the Institute of Romance studies, located on the plac Biskupa Nankiera 4, at 12:00 in room 3.2
prof. dr hab. Beata Baczyńska
Director of the Institute of Romance studies of University of Wrocław
Chairperson of the Board of scientific discipline Literary studies of the University of Wrocław
Memorial service held for prof. Floriana Śmieja, deceased in Canada on the 4th September 2019, will take place in the church under the invocation of Corpus Christi in Zabrze-Kończyce on 9th September 2023 (Saturday) at 10:00.
Profesor Florian Śmieja was born on 22nd August 1925 in Kończyce near to Zabrze, passed away on 4th September 2019 in Mississauga in Canada. He was a brilliant hispanist, poet, translator and a redactor of significant émigré literary magazines. In 2015 he received an honorary doctorate from the University of Wrocław.
Florian Śmieja was born during the interwar period on the suburbs of Zabrze, on the Polish side of the border, to which his parents, natives of Śląsk Opolski, moved after the uprisings and demarcation of borders. He attended school in Kończyce, then middle school in Tarnowskie Góry.
During the occupation period, as a 15-years-old boy, he was deported to forced labour to Mecklenburg. Towards the end of the war, he went to Belgium, where after the liberation by Allied Forces, he joined General Maczek’s brigade. After demobilisation, he did not return to Poland. In 1947 he passed high school diploma in Scotland, in 1950 he obtained bachelor’s degree in literature in Irish Cork, and in 1955 – master’s degree in Spanish studies at the London King’s College.
At that place as well, Florian Śmieja earned a doctorate under the guidance of Alexander Parker, internationally renowned hispanist. Dissertation, under the title “Alonso de Ledesma and the Rise of the Religious Concepto” was defended in 1962. Subsequently, he lectured at the London School of Economics, University of Nottingham, and since 1969 at the University of Western Ontario in Canadian London.
As a scholar from the British school of Spanish studies, he was interested in baroque literature, tracked Spanish trails in Polish culture, as well as Polish influences in Hispanic religious theatre. To his major accomplishments belongs critical editing, including edition of the comedy by Miguela de Cervantes, “El rufián dichoso” (published in 1977) or previously unknown works of baroque playwright, Agustin Moreto, an author and co-author of nearly a hundred of texts, belonging to so-called Calderón school : El lego del Carmen (pub. 1970) and Antes morir que pecar (San Casimiro) (pub. 1992). That last one being dedicated to figure of Polish saint, Kazimierz Jagiellończyk prince, portrayed as a martyr of carnal purity, indicated at the second important area of Floriana Śmieja’s interest – literary connections between Poland and Spain understood as mutual influences, the Polish presence in the Spanish literature, especially amongst the dramaturges of the Golden Age in our area.
A prominent place is taken by articles published in the world’s most important Spanish and philological periodicals which reminded about the contribution of not well-known or forgotten Poles to the development of European culture, as well as the Latin translations of St. John of the Cross done by Andrzej Brzechwa, the impact of Kazimierz Sarbiewski’s theory on the Spanish conceptualist Baltasar Gracián, and the publications discovering previously unknown details of adaptations and performances of Spanish dramaturgic works, among others, by Juan de Flores, but, above all works of Pedro Calderona de la Barca – Śmieja discovered evidence of the presence of his production on the scenes of 18th and 19th century Lviv. Yet another group consists of studies and sketches devoted to images of Spain and Spanish people mentioned by Polish travellers, including the prince Władysław Waza, a witness to the Breda siege, and to the characteristic of Polish characters appearing in Spanish literature, like for example St. Jacek Odrowąż, St. Stanisław or Jan III Sobieski, and to description of Poland and Polish people in the works of Cervantes or Pedro de Alarcón.
Since the fifties, Florian Śmiej was simultaneously an active participant of Polish cultural life of the émigré. He published several poetry books, as well as a few volumes of sketches and memoirs. He co-founded and leaded London-based literary magazines “Merkuriusz Polski” and “Kontynenty”, and co-worked with the „Wiadomości”, „Kultura”, „Związkowiec”. After the Thaw, like many emigrants of his generation, he gradually established contacts in homeland, publishing in the “Tygodnik Powszechny ” and “Więź “. He also translated Spanish prose for the Wydawnictwo Literackie Publishing House, including the extremely difficult in matters of stylistics novel “Time of Silence” by Luis Martin-Santos.
After the fall of the Iron Curtain Florian Śmieja ‘s periods of stay in Poland became prolonged in duration, and the relations took on an official dimension. For the invitation issued by Piotr Sawicki, who managed the freshly launched Spanish studies in Wrocław, since 1991 for the next seven years Florian Śmieja passed one, usually the summer one, semester in the Institute of Romance Studies at our University of Wrocław. He was giving classes concerning the Spanish literature of the Golden Age, managed over many master’s theses and contributed to the academic development of the young faculty of Spanish studies. In 2005, a book “Rzeczywiste i możliwe. Rozmowy z Florianem Śmieją” of the authorship of two Wrocław-based Hispanic studies specialists – Marcin Kruk and Justyna Ziarkowska was released. A Hispanic studies journal ‘Estudios Hispánicos’ published by IFR, dedicated to him two issues – first to commemorate his 70 birthday (1997), the second one to celebrate the reception of awarding the title of the honorary doctorate by the University of Wrocław in 2015. That was the last time when he visited Silesia and Poland. At that time, in Aula Leopoldina, he received from the Spanish Ambassador, given to him by Felipe VI, King of Spain, a distinction of Cruz de Encomienda de la Orden de Isabel la Católica for his services to propagation of Spanish culture and literature.
The Council of the Faculty of Letters, by the resolution no. 106/2023 of 20th June 2023, gave the name of prof. dr. dr. honoris causa of the University of Wrocław, Florian Śmieja, to the lecture room no. 4.1. located in the building on pl. Biskupa Nankiera 4 in Wrocław in the Institute of Romance Studies at the Faculty of Letters of University of Wrocław. A solemn ceremony of conferring the name will take place on 12th September 2023.
(Complied by Marcin Kurek, 30.01.2023)
Translated by Marta Kłyszejko (student of English Studies at the University of Wrocław) as part of the translation practice.
