Urszula Kozioł

Urszula Kozioł (; 20 June 1931 – 20 July 2025) was a Polish poet and writer. She was a recipient of the Silesius Poetry Award and the Nike Award (2024).

Life and career Kozioł was born in Rakówka, a village in Poland on 20 June 1931. She attended high school in Zamość and graduated from the University of Wroclaw in 1953.

Her debut poetry collection was Gumowe klocki ("Blocks of rubber", 1957), but her second, W rytmie korzeni ("In the Rhythm of the Roots", 1963), is considered her breakthrough. Of her 1963 poem "Recipe for the Meat Course", translator Karen Kovacik writes that it "functions simultaneously as an ars poetica and an ironic riposte to those who believed a woman's place was in the kitchen" and "depict housework or domestic life through motifs of violence and estrangement."

Her novel Postoje pamięci ("Stations of Memory", 1965) focuses on Mirka, the daughter of a teacher, growing up in a small village during World War II. In his survey of Polish literature, Czesław Miłosz wrote that it was "One of the most authentic testimonies on the village".

She began editing the magazine Odra in 1968.

Kozioł died on 20 July 2025, at the age of 94.

Selected awards and honours Nike Award (2024) Gloria Artis Gold Medal for Merit to Culture (2024) Kazimierz Hoffman Poetry Prize (2020) Warsaw Literary Prize (2015) Silesius Poetry Lifetime Achievement Award (2011) Honorary Citizen of the City of Wrocław (2009) Honorary doctorate of the University of Wrocław Der Eichendorff Literatur-Preis (2002) Polish PEN Club Award (1998) Commander's Cross of the Order of Polonia Restituta (1997) Knight's Cross of the Order of Polonia Restituta (1981) Cold Cross of Merit (1974) Kościelski Award (1969)