An Evening of Borrowed Rooms in Kraków

On a warm Thursday in the middle of August, about forty people climbed a narrow staircase in Podgórze to hear Aurelia Stanek and Mira Halloran read from Borrowed Rooms. The room belongs to a printmaker who lends it out for readings in the summer, when the presses are quiet. We had put out thirty chairs. People sat on the windowsills and on the stairs.

Aurelia opened with Keys Returned on the Last Day. She had not read it aloud since the issue came out in February, and she stopped twice to say she would cut a sentence if she were writing it now. She did not say which ones. Mira read Sublet twice, first in English and then in the French she started it in, and asked us to listen for the line where the two versions disagree. Most of the room found it. A few people found a different one, which pleased her more.

Questions

The questions went where they usually go after an issue about tenancy: deposits, landlords, the flat everyone still dreams about. One reader had brought a key to a flat in Nowa Huta that she left in 1998 and never handed back. She wanted to know whether it was too late to post it. Aurelia said yes, keep it. Mira said no, send it. We did not settle it.

The wine ran out at nine and the last people left a little after ten. Thank you to everyone who came, and to our host, who swept the stairs before and after.