Tokarczuk’s book won a Nike Literary Award and an International Booker Prize. It is a rich collection of stories seemingly not attached to each other, stories that are both contemporary and historical. Tokarczuk observes people on the move, and those striving to immobilize life through the eternal practice of body mummification.

Michał Zadara, a laureate of “Polityka’s” passport and a winner of Konrad Swinarski’s award, finds in “Bieguni” an innovative way of storytelling, one allowing to describe human experiences in an authentic way.

“Olga Tokarczuk portrayed – says the director – a life that gives a chance at capturing sense, but that chance disappeared and we are once again drowning in chaos. However, that chance existed and it keeps on leading us through chaos, with a hope that somewhere at the end of this pilgrimage we will find the answers”.

Olga Tokarczuk joins a group of classic authors, whose works were interpreted by Michał Zadara in last years: Mickiewicz, Sophocles, Euripides, Słowacki, Brecht, or the authors of the Bible…. “Tokarczuk’s books are the classics of the new era being born right in front of our eyes – classics of a world that has definitely refused us any cohesion. And this cohesion is not even something that we miss, we are taming the decay” – adds the director.

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A work in progress show happened on the 5th of December 2020, as a part of  Boska Komedia theatrical festival (in an online version on the Play Kraków platform).

Coproducer: Łaźnia Nowa Theatre