Bruno Jasieński

Who was Bruno Jasieński?

Bruno Jasieński was a Polish poet and leader of the Polish futurist movement, executed during the Polish operation of the NKVD in the Soviet Union.

Wiktor was born to a Polish family of Zysmans with Jewish and German roots, but from his mother's side he was a descendant of nobility. His father, Jakub Zysman, was a local doctor and a social worker, member of the local intelligentsia. He converted to Protestantism, mostly to be able to marry a Catholic girl, Eufemia Maria Modzelewska, a Polish noble, member of the Modzelewski family of the Bończa coat of arms, with whom he had three children: Wiktor, Jerzy and Irena. Today one of the streets of Klimontów is named after him.

Little is known of Jasieński's early life, especially as he did not describe it in his works. He attended high school in Warsaw, but didn't finish it. In 1914 his family moved to Russia, where Bruno graduated from the secondary school in Moscow. There, his fascination with Igor Severyanin's ego-futurism started, followed by lectures of Velimir Chlebnikov, Vladimir Mayakovsky and Alexiey Kruchonykh's Visual poems. In 1918, after Poland regained its independence, Bruno returned to Kraków, where he applied for a position in the philosophical faculty of the Jagiellonian University. However, he suspended his studies to join the volunteer unit of the Polish Army and took part in the disarming of Austrian and German soldiers. After the Polish-Soviet War, he returned to University and studied at various faculties. He also became one of the founders of a club of futurists named Katarynka.