Karl Dedecius
Karl Dedecius (20 May 1921 in Łódź – 26 February 2016) - was a Polish-born German translator of Polish and Russian literature.
Karl Dedecius
Rheinlender · CC BY 2.5
- Born
- 1921 · Łódź.
- Died
- 2016 · Frankfurt.
- Nationality
- Germany
- Occupation
- linguist · writer · translator · essayist · philologist · editor
- Fields
- translating activity · literature · translation from Polish · translation into German
- Honours
- Samuel-Bogumil-Linde prize · Peace Prize of the German Publishers' and Booksellers' Association · Hessian Cultural Prize · German National Prize · Hessian Order of Merit · Knight Commander's Cross of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany
- Languages
- German
VALÉORINE Encyclopedia
VALÉORINE documentary reading
Documentary summary
Karl Dedecius (20 May 1921 in Łódź – 26 February 2016) - was a Polish-born German translator of Polish and Russian literature.
Admitted source layer · organised and presented by VALÉORINE
Note VALÉORINE
No house-authored Note is published until its assertions and sources pass the VALÉORINE evidence contract. The documentary article remains available in full while that enrichment is being consolidated.
Documentary enrichment in progress · no unsupported statement published
Reference Check
Propose documentary evidence for Karl Dedecius. A contribution is never written directly as fact: identity, source, rights and evidence gates still decide.
Sign in to contribute
Documentary evidence
Evidence Panel
not yet certified
- Identity
- resolved
- Independent source families
- 0
- Admitted assertions
- 0
- Open conflicts
- 0
Authority files
gnd · 1393411533 · wikidata · Q74252 · wikipedia · Karl Dedecius
In this article
Life
Life
The recorded working language is German. The field of work recorded is translating activity, literature and translation from Polish. Places of work recorded in the authority are Frankfurt and Darmstadt. Distinctions recorded are Samuel-Bogumil-Linde prize, Peace Prize of the German Publishers' and Booksellers' Association, Hessian Cultural Prize and German National Prize.
Dedecius was born to ethnic German parents in the city of Łódź, Poland, then a multicultural and multilingual city, which, though formerly ruled by the House of Romanov, at that time had only recently become a part of the newly founded Second Polish Republic. Dedecius attended the Polish Stefan-Żeromski High School, where he received his high-school degree (Matura). After the German invasion of Poland in the Second World War, Dedecius was first conscripted into the Reich Labor Service (Reichsarbeitsdienst) and then into the German Army. He was severely wounded in the Battle of Stalingrad and became a prisoner of war. During his time as a prisoner of war in the Gulag system of the Soviet Union, he taught himself Russian. Dedecius wrote, "I lay in my sick-bed, and the nurses brought me books by Lermontov, for instance. For one year, I learned the Cyrillic Alphabet and Russian by reading Lermontov and Pushkin. Eventually, the guards asked me to write love-letters for them, because I wrote like Pushkin." • Illustration — Dedecius in conversation with journalist Alina Perth-Grabowska, 1995 Dedecius was finally released from Soviet captivity in 1950. He settled first with his fiancé in Weimar, in East Germany. In 1952, he emigrated to West Germany and became an employee of the Allianz insurance company. In his free time, he occupied himself with Polish culture and with Polish literary translation, and maintained contact with anti-communist Polish dissident and émigré writers. Dedecius remarked... "Only when I had gotten myself set up in life and enjoyed some stability was I able to turn to literature in a long-term and systematic way, although my career, you could say, had nothing whatever to do with writing." In the introduction to the Polish edition of "On Translating," Jerzy Kwiatkowski wrote: "Speaking formally, one could say that this translator’s great work came about on his evenings off, as a result of a hobby." In 1959, he published his first anthology, Lektion der Stille (Lesson of Silence). In the following years, he translated, so to speak in his free time, such well-known Polish writers as Zbigniew Herbert, Stanisław Jerzy Lec, Czesław Miłosz, Tadeusz Różewicz and Wisława Szymborska. He also published essays on Polish literature and his own literary translation techniques. In 1980, he initiated the German Poland Institute in Darmstadt. He served as the institute's director from 1980 through 1997. Meanwhile, continued his literary activities. Dedecius’ main achievements were the 50-volume "Polish Library" canon, which appeared between 1982 and 2000 from the Suhrkamp Verlag publishing house and the 7-volume "Panorama of Polish Literature of the 20th Century" (1996–2000), whose final volume presented a kind of Dedecius autobiography. Dedecius died in Frankfurt, Germany on 26 February 2016 at the age of 94.
Works
Works
• 1971: Deutsche und Polen. Botschaft der Bücher. [Germans and Poles: The Diplomacy of Books] München: Hanser.. • 1974 "Überall ist Polen" [Poland is Everywhere], Frankfurt a.M.: Suhrkamp. • 1975: Polnische Profile [Polish Profiles]. Frankfurt a.M.: Suhrkamp.. • 1981: Zur Literatur und Kultur Polens [On the Literature and Culture of Poland] Frankfurt a.M.: Suhrkamp. • 1981: Polnische Pointen Satiren und kleine Prosa des 20.Jahrhunderts Karl Dedecius. Ullstein Buch • 1986: Vom Übersetzen. Theorie und Praxis [On Translating: Theory and Practice] Frankfurt a.M.: Suhrkamp.. • 1988: Von Polens Poeten [On Poland's Poets] Frankfurt a.M.: Suhrkamp.. • 1990: Lebenslauf aus Büchern und Blättern [A Curriculum Vitae Made of Books and Pages] Frankfurt a.M.: Suhrkamp.. • 1996: Ost West Basar. Ansprachen Essays Würdigungen. [East-West Bazaar: Addresses, Essays and Appreciations] With a foreword by Marion Gräfin Dönhoff. Selected and with an Afterword by Andreas Lawaty. Zürich: Ammann-Verlag. • 2000: Panorama der polnischen Literatur des 20. Jahrhunderts. Abt.V. Panorama. Ein Rundblick [Panorama of Polish Literature of the 20th Century: Section V. Panorama.] Zürich: Ammann-Verlag.. • 2002: Die Kunst der Übersetzung [The Art of Translating] Berlin: Logos Verlag.. • 2006: Ein Europäer aus Lodz: Erinnerungen [A European from Lodz: Memoirs] Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp,
Career and activity
Career and activity
Karl Dedecius worked in translating activity, literature, translation from Polish and translation into German. He belonged to PEN Germany, German Academy for Language and Literature and Bavarian Academy of Fine Arts. He worked at Frankfurt and Darmstadt.
Identity
Identity
Karl Dedecius is recorded as having received Samuel-Bogumil-Linde prize, Peace Prize of the German Publishers' and Booksellers' Association and Hessian Cultural Prize.

Das Grab des deutschen Übersetzers und Schriftstellers Karl Dedecius und seiner Ehefrau Elvira Tabea geborene Roth auf dem Südfriedhof Frankfurt am Main.
Harvey Kneeslapper
Life and career
Dated record
Life and career
The full dated record · 2 entries
1921
Karl Dedecius born at Łódź.
2016
Karl Dedecius died at Frankfurt.
Places
Named by the record
Places
Only places the record itself states, plotted where the house gazetteer settles their coordinates. Nothing is inferred from a name or a nationality.
Łódź.
Birth place
Frankfurt.
Death place
Recognition and collections
Where the work is held
Recognition and collections
Karl Dedecius received Samuel-Bogumil-Linde prize, Peace Prize of the German Publishers' and Booksellers' Association, Hessian Cultural Prize, German National Prize, Hessian Order of Merit and Knight Commander's Cross of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany.
Documents and archives
Primary material
Documents and archives
reference work
- Wikidata, structured authority record Q74252: Karl Dedecius
Reputable secondary · Wikidata
- “Karl Dedecius”, English Wikipedia, consulted as further reading
Reputable secondary · Wikipedia
authority file
- Gemeinsame Normdatei 1393411533, Exlibris für Karl Dedecius.
Unverified · Deutsche Nationalbibliothek
Honors
Dedecius received many honorary doctorates, prizes and awards. In 1967, he was awarded the Johann-Heinrich-Voß-Preis für Übersetzung. In 1990, he received the Friedenspreis des Deutschen Buchhandels, in 1997 the Samuel-Bogumil-Linde-Preis. Since 2004, the Robert Bosch Stiftung, in cooperation with the German Poland institute, awards the Karl-Dedecius-Preis for translators, which is endowed with a prize of €10,000.
Literature
• Elvira Grözinger, Andreas Lawaty (Eds.): Suche die Meinung: Karl Dedecius, dem Übersetzer und Mittler zum 65. Geburtstag [Searching for the Opinion: Festschrift for the Translator and Intermediary Karl Dedecius on his 65th Birthday] Wiesbaden 1986, Otto Harrassowitz.. • Manfred Mack (Ed.): "Karl Dedecius und das Deutsche Polen-Institut. Laudationes, Berichte, Interviews, Gedichte" [Karl Dedecius and the German Poland Institute. Laidatios, Reports, Interviews, Poems]. Darmstadt 1991, Justus von Liebig Verlag,. • Hubert Orłowski: Karl Dedecius, in Marek Zybura (Ed.):...nie będzie nigdy Niemiec Polakowi bratem...? Wrocław: Okis. pp. 268–279..
Notes from the source article
Cited by Wikipedia
Notes from the source article
These works are cited by the source article, in its own numbering. They are recorded as its citations, not as sources VALÉORINE has verified.
References
Citations
References
Each reference names the institution holding it, so a reader may go to the document itself.
authority file
Gemeinsame Normdatei 1393411533, Exlibris für Karl Dedecius.Deutsche Nationalbibliothek
Partially resolvedreference work
Partially resolvedreference work
Partially resolved
The Encyclopedia exists whether or not anything is for sale. Corrections are recorded rather than overwritten, and every version of this record is kept. Published 14 August 2026.
Elsewhere in Books
38,960 published records in this field, each with its sources named.
- Karl BlumauerAuthor
- Karl BöttigerAuthor
- Karl BraunAuthor
- Karl CostaAuthor
- Karl Eduard SöötAuthor
- Karl EggersAuthor
- Karl Egon EbertAuthor
- Karl EichwaldAuthor
Best supported in this field
For owners
Own a work by Karl Dedecius?
A specialist will read what you send and tell you what the house can establish, what it cannot, and whether the object is suited to sale. There is no charge and no obligation. The object stays with you throughout; nothing is shipped to us unless it is arranged in writing beforehand.