Virtual Polish Book Club. Meet the author – Katarzyna Jakubiak

Katarzyna Jakubiak’s new book contains 24 essays, which, often going beyond the genre, are a record of the political and personal concerns and doubts of the author, an immigrant in the USA and a lecturer at the University of Pennsylvania. “Obce stany” is a book about America and its incongruous faces that have become particularly visible since the election of Donald Trump as president in 2016. It is also a book about motherhood as a form of resistance against injustice, callousness, and divisions. Motherhood is here a figure meaning care not only for one’s children but also for other people’s children and for all those who are weaker and discriminated against; it is a concern practiced not only by mothers but also by fathers and childless people. Such a maternal ethos shapes the world of Jakubiak’s essays, where scenes from family life and university literature classes are played out against the backdrop of political storms raging in America and the world, including Pennsylvania’s local community.