Beautiful Twentysomethings (Cornell University Press)

Beautiful Twenty somethings is a vivid firsthand account of the life of Marek Hlasko, a young writer whose iconoclastic way of life became an inspiration in 1950s Poland. Detailing relationships with such giants of Polish culture as the filmmaker Roman Polanski and the novelist Jerzy Andrzejewski, this memoir recounts his adventures and misadventures abroad in the postwar era. When he was recalled to Poland in 1958, Hlasko refused to return and was stripped of his Polish citizenship. He spent the rest of his life working in exile.