Kazimierz Wierzyński was born in
Drohobycz (Drohobych),
Kingdom of Galicia and Lodomeria. He was a co-founder, with
Julian Tuwim and three other poets, of the
Skamander group of experimental poets. His work
Olympic Laurel (
Polish:
Laur olimpijski, 1927), which idealizes the grace and fitness of
athletes, won the gold medal for poetry at the
1928 Olympic Games in
Amsterdam, and his other early poems also celebrate the joy of living. In September 1939, after the invasion of Poland by Nazi Germany, Wierzyński and his wife Helena escaped from Poland and, via Romania, Yugoslavia, Italy, and France, eventually reached the USA, where they stayed for almost twenty years. His later works, written in exile, are more somber and socially conscious.
The Bitter Crop (1933) includes poems about the
United States. His
Forgotten Battlefield (1944) contains narratives of
World War II. He died in
London, England. ==See also==