About Znak Publishers
Founded in 1959 as one of few independent and private-owned publishing houses in Poland, Znak is generally credited for publishing quality works in fiction and non-fiction: philosophy, religion, social sciences, history, and film.
Every year Znak publishes over 100 titles by Polish and foreign authors, both classics like St Augustine, St Thomas Aquinas, Shakespeare, Tocqueville, Nietzsche, Hegel as well as reputable contemporaries: Pope John Paul II, Pope Benedict XVI, Czesław Miłosz, Joseph Brodsky, Seamus Heaney, Norman Davies, Timothy Garton Ash, Krzysztof Kieślowski and Andrzej Wajda.
We take pride in publishing such excellent novelists as: James Joyce, Mario Vargas Llosa, J.M. Coetzee, Zadie Smith, Margaret Atwood, John Banville and Yann Martel.
Znak is also known and respected for its promotion of talented first-time authors. In 1998, we introduced our own fiction competition. The winning book was Madame by Antoni Libera. It has proved to be an enormous success, also in terms of sales. Moreover, it was shortlisted for the Nike literary prize, the most prestigious one in Poland. The rights to Madame have been sold to 23 foreign publishers including such distinguished ones as Farrar, Straus and Giroux, dtv, Europa Kiadó, Longanesi, Bonniers, Patakis, and is still being reviewed by many publishers worldwide.
Znak is proud to be the exclusive publisher of most renowned Polish authors: Paweł Huelle, Wiesław Myśliwski and Wojciech Tochman.
In 2001 Znak launched a new literature series for children and young adults. We aim to introduce Polish readers to the finest classics of world literature for children, and to contemporary authors producing original, ground-breaking books.
Our selection includes Sempe and Goscinny’s Nicolas, and a whole range of beautifully illustrated, clever books by Janosch. We publish the superb, very funny Horrid Henry series by Francesca Simon, as well as books by Philip Pullman, Jeanette Winterson, J.M. Barrie, Geraldine McCaughrean, Anthony Horowitz, Ted Hughes and Eoin Colfer.
