Collecting the Show on the Road: Spotlight on Anna Mieszkowska and the Polish Cabaret Archive

The article introduces and then gives a transcription of an interview with Anna Mieszkowska, an archivist at the Polish Academy of Sciences who specializes in collecting materials relating to Polish cabaret of the interwar and wartime era. The introduction justifies the historical and cultural importance of her work and outlines the materials housed in this unique archive and how they are organized. In the interview, Mieszkowska chronicles her efforts to document prewar and émigré cabaret. She began her research tentatively in the 1980s, despite the inattention given by Polish theater studies of that time to cabaret and official disapproval. Mieszkowska’s research and related travels became easier after the fall of communism, but more urgent due to the advancing age of surviving performers. The interview also touches on Mieszkowska’s personal engagement with her subjects and their surviving friends and family, the place of cabaret in Polish culture, and comparison of Polish cabaret traditions with those of other countries, ending with an appended list of significant cabaret artists.

Duke Scholars

Author Beth Holmgren Slavic & Eurasian Studies