Czeslaw Milosz was born June 30,
1911 in Seteiniai, Lithuania, as a son of Aleksander Milosz, a
civil engineer, and Weronika, née Kunat. He made his
high-school and university studies in Wilno, then belonging to
Poland. A co-founder of a literary group "Zagary", he made his
literary début in 1930, published in the 1930s two volumes
of poetry and worked for the Polish Radio. Most of the war time
he spent in Warsaw working there for the underground
presses.
In the diplomatic service of the People's Poland since 1945, he
broke with the government in 1951 and settled in France where he
wrote several books in prose. In 1953 he received Prix
Littéraire Européen.
In 1960, invited by the University of California, he moved to
Berkeley where he has been, since 1961, Professor of Slavic
Languages and Literatures.
Presented with an award for poetry translations from the Polish
P.E.N. Club in Warsaw in 1974; a Guggenheim Fellow for poetry
1976; received a honorary degree Doctor of Letters from the
University of
Michigan, Ann Arbor, in 1977; won the Neustadt International
Prize for Literature in 1978; received the "Berkeley Citation"
(an equivalent of a honorary Ph.D.) in 1978; nominated by the
Academic Senate a "Research Lecturer" of 1979/1980.
From Nobel Lectures, Literature 1968-1980, Editor-in-Charge Tore Frängsmyr, Editor Sture Allén, World Scientific Publishing Co., Singapore, 1993
This autobiography/biography was written at the time of the award and first published in the book series Les Prix Nobel. It was later edited and republished in Nobel Lectures. To cite this document, always state the source as shown above.
Czeslaw Milosz died on August 14, 2004.
Copyright © The Nobel Foundation 1980
Czeslaw Milosz
