Szczebrzeszyn

SStigliano_Cricket960
Four color linocut printed on a Vandercook proofing press, 7 x 5” 2012. This piece was inspired by the town in which we worked. The town’s name is the subject of a popular tongue twister that any citizen will recite for you when you try to pronounce Szczebrzeszyn.

 

Chrząszcz

W Szczebrzeszynie chrząszcz brzmi w trzcinie

I Szczebrzeszyn z tego słynie.

Wół go pyta: “Panie chrząszczu,

Po cóż pan tak brzęczy w gąszczu?”

                              

Poem by Jan Brzechwa


Cricket

In the town of Szczebrzeszyn a beetle buzzes in the reeds

And Szczebrzeszyn is famous for it.

An ox asks him, “Mister Beetle,

What are you buzzing for in the bushes?”

                              

Translation by Walter Whipple

Author of the article

Stephanie Mahan Stigliano currently teaches Printmaking and Books as Art at Walnut Hill School for the Arts, Natick, MA. Stigliano contributed three books to the international traveling exhibition Al-Mutanabbi Street Starts Here, which will become part of the collection of the Baghdad National Library of Iraq. She is East Coast Coordinator for the traveling exhibition of prints, Absence and Presence, which had its inaugural exhibition at San Francisco Center for the Book in December, 2014.