Janusz A. Zajdel Award


The Janusz A. Zajdel Award, often called just Zajdel,
is the annual award given by the Polish science fiction and fantasy fandom for the best stories published in the previous year. It was established in 1984.
It is the most prestigious of several Polish awards for that genre of literature.
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Categories

The winners are chosen in a vote by fans present at the annual Polcon convention from up to five nominations in each of two categories:
  • Novel: works longer than approximately 30,000 words
  • Short story: shorter works.
Instant-runoff voting with "No award" as one of the choices is the method used.
Vote counts are not announced.

History

Previously the Polish Union of Fans of Science Fiction issued the for works of science fiction.
The Zajdel award was created in 1984 under the name Sfinks. After the death of the first winner, Janusz A. Zajdel, in 1985, the name was changed in his memory. Zajdel's widow, Jadwiga Zajdel, has presented the award to the winners since then.
Until 1989, the award was given by Polish science fiction fan associations, voting as units; since 1990, all fans present at Polcon convention can vote. Since 1991 the system has been based on two-tier ballot, compared to the system used in the Hugo Award.
Until 1991, there was a single award given for the best story; since 1992, there are two categories: novel and short story.
The statuette given to the winners since 1991 was designed by sculptor Wiesław Bielak, professor at the Jan Matejko Academy of Fine Arts.
In 2000, several stories by Zajdel winners were translated to English in the Anthology: Chosen by Fate: Zajdel Award Winners. That volume contained the translations of Ewa Białołęcka's "Jestem Lamia", Anna Brzezińska's, Marek S. Huberath's "Kocia obecność", Tomasz Kołodziejczak's , Feliks W. Kres's "Korona Shergardów", Andrzej Sapkowski's and Rafał A. Ziemkiewicz's "Dobra wróżka".
In 2014, a free online e-book of the stories nominated for year 2013 was made available.

Winners

The year given is the year of publication. Since 1992, novels and short stories have been judged separately. The winners of the award are:

Winner summaries

2019: Radek Rak, ''Baśń o wężowym sercu...''

The novel is loosely based on the legends about Jakub Szela, the leader of a 1846 peasant uprising known as the Galician slaughter. It gained several other literary awards.

2019: Marta Potocka, "Chomik"

Marta Potocka is a young writer, with several short stories. She works as a programmer. Her winning work "Chomik" was published in the e-zine , no. 5, 2019. The story is set in the near future Poland. The heavily criticized Social Insurance Institution is closed and the basic social security payment is introduced to everybody subject to the condition that to qualify for it the person must join the program of Social Monitoring. The Social Insurance Institution is replaced with the Social Balance Institution, whose function is to control that people spend as much money as possible. Those who do not want to spend are called "hamsters", i.e., "hoarders". An employee of SII tries to handle a particularly tough "hamster" and fails, but instead uncovers a much larger problem. Chomik is available online.