Maja Wolny was born on 30th November 1976 in Kielce, Poland.
She is a writer.
From 1998 to 2002, she worked as a journalist for the cultural section of the weekly magazine Polityka. Between 2002 and 2015, she lived in Belgium, the home country of her husband, Marc Peirs, a journalist.
In the early years of her professional career in Belgium, she dedicated herself to promoting knowledge about Central and Eastern Europe. To this end, she founded the Post Viadrina Foundation, which operated from 2004 to 2010.
From 2010 to 2015, she served as the director of the Belgian NAVIGO Museum, where she curated numerous exhibitions exploring the connections between culture, literature, and the sea. Her most notable achievement was the 2011 exhibition titled “Zeerotica” (“The Erotica of the Sea”).
Between 2015 and 2016, Wolny wrote columns for VRT, the leading Flemish online news platform.
She combined her intense professional life with the development of her writing career. In 2009, she published her debut novel, “Kara”, followed by “Dom tysiąca nocy” (The House of a Thousand Nights) in 2010.
While in Belgium, she discovered the story of photographer Julia Pirotte, whom she made the central character of her next novel, “Czarne liście” (Black Leaves) in 2016. The book sparked widespread interest, and one of the most prestigious Dutch publishers, Bezige Bij, acquired worldwide publication rights.
Maja Wolny’s next success came in 2017 when her literary thriller “Księgobójca” (The Bookkiller) won the Belgian Hercule Poirot Prize for literature.
In 2015, Maja Wolny returned to Poland, settling with her husband and two children in Kazimierz Dolny on the Vistula River. She continues her writing career, regularly publishing new books.
Interview conducted by Joanna Majchrzak 13 December 2021 in Gdynia.
Photography and editing by Łukasz Laskowski.
