Timeline

Key figures

Origin and history

The Polish Historical and Literary Society (SHLP) finds its origins in the Polish insurrection of 1830-1831 against Russian domination. After the defeat and capture of Warsaw in September 1831, thousands of Poles chose exile, mainly in France, to mark the beginning of the Great Emigration. As early as 1832, an exiled group, including Prince Adam Jerzy Czartoryski, founded the Literary Society, recognized by Napoleon III in 1866. It then became the SHLP, a cultural and intellectual home for Poles in exile.

The Polish Library of Paris, founded in 1838, was installed in 1854 in a 17th-century building on the quay d'Orléans on the island of Saint-Louis. Today it houses 220,000 books, archives, works of art and museums dedicated to Adam Mickiewicz and Frédéric Chopin. In 2013, the Library, the SHLP and the Adam Mickiewicz Museum were registered in UNESCO's World Memory Register, highlighting their heritage importance.

The SHLP included among its members leading French and Polish personalities, such as Hélène Carrère d'Encausse, Marie Curie, André Gide and Czesław Miłosz. Managed in partnership with the Polish Academy of Arts and Sciences in Krakow since 2004, it remains a living place for research and dissemination of Polish culture, open to academics and the general public.

External links