This year’s Port Wroclaw has been scheduled for the period from the 24th till the 26th of April. Most of the meetings will take place in the Współczesny Theatre at ul. Rzeźnicza.
"Such a rally of poets has not taken place in Poland for a long time. It’s going to be an attractive event. I’m going there, anyway", announces Darek Foks, one of the Port poets.
The jubilee edition of the Port is to summarise the 20 years of the festival’s existence – 14 events "in a nutshell' will serve as an overview of the most important Port events. Poets’ meetings – the most legendary ones, which seem to have gained the status of cult events – were organised in Legnica in the 1990s. In 2004, Fort Legnica moved to Wroclaw and changed its name into Port Wroclaw. The organisers announce that the program will contain references to meetings, happenings (such as the reading of poems in a hairdresser’s salon), concerts and competitions that took place during the last 20 years. The Port is accompanied by the "Catalogue of Memories from the Fort and the Port (1996-2015)", where poets and other people connected with the festival recollect various anecdotes, meetings as well as spoken and read poems. Moreover, an anthology of "100 Polish poems of relevant length" (100 wierszy polskich stosownej długości) will be published on the 20th anniversary of the festival.
The festival will be an opportunity for a rally of authors – not only those connected with Biuro Literackie, but also those who have not published their volumes there for years. Among them there will be Grzegorz Wróblewski, Darek Foks, Marcin Sendecki, Andrzej Sosnowski, Krzysztof Jaworski, Marta Podgórnik, Jacek Podsiadło, Julia Szychowiak and others.
This year’s music background of the Port will be prepared by the G.A.N.G. band with Patrycja Hefczyńska, who performed together with the Oszibarack band during the 1st edition of the Port. The program includes also a concert promoting BL’s latest album ‘"Port Songs" (Portowe piosenki) with guest appearances of Kora, Filip Zawada and Agnieszka Szydłowska. The album is the culmination of the competition in which young bands selected poems and arranged music for them. The concert will take place in Stary Klasztor – in addition, the Pustki band will play.
"The celebration of the jubilee will not be particularly loud. It will rather resemble a reunion of an old rock band for a farewell concert", says Artur Burszta.
Is it a farewell of the Literary Port to Wroclaw? Artur Burszta neither confirms or denies this. He says diplomatically: "Wroclaw has always been open to us. Nothing is permanent for us, everything may change".
The Literary Port has recently begun to expand abroad. Polish poets have already read poems in Riga – the European Capital of Culture 2014 and in India, and now they are planning to visit Armenia, China, Czech Republic, Israel, Lithuania, Germany, Norway and Wales.
The 20th Literary Port – the 24th – 26th of April 2015, readings in the Współczesny Theatre, free entrance.
