Editing Czesław Miłosz (section)

==Life in Europe==
===Origins and early life===
Czesław Miłosz was born on 30 June 1911, in the village of [[Šeteniai]] ({{langx|pl|Szetejnie}}), [[Kovno Governorate]], [[Russian Empire]] (now [[Kėdainiai district municipality|Kėdainiai district]], [[Kaunas County]], [[Lithuania]]). He was the son of Aleksander Miłosz (1883–1959), a Polish civil engineer, and his wife, Weronika (née Kunat; 1887–1945).<ref>{{Cite book|title=Milosz: A Biography|last=Franaszek, Andrzej|publisher=Harvard University Press|year=2017|isbn=9780674977419|location=Cambridge|oclc=982122195|quote=Birth and death of Miłosz's parents are noted on pp. 36, 38, 242, 243.}}</ref>

Miłosz was born into a prominent family. On his mother's side, his grandfather was Zygmunt Kunat, a descendant of a Polish family that traced its lineage to the 13th century and owned an estate in [[Krasnogruda]] (in present-day Poland). Having studied agriculture in Warsaw, Zygmunt settled in Šeteniai after marrying Miłosz's grandmother, Jozefa, a descendant of the noble Syruć family, which was of Lithuanian origin. One of her ancestors, {{ill|Szymon Syruć|pl|Szymon Syruć}}, had been personal secretary to [[Stanisław Leszczyński|Stanisław I]], King of Poland and Grand Duke of Lithuania.<ref>{{Cite book|title=Milosz: A Biography|last=Franaszek, Andrzej|pages=35|oclc=982122195}}</ref> Miłosz's paternal grandfather, Artur Miłosz, was also from a noble family and fought in the 1863 [[January Uprising]] for Polish independence. Miłosz's grandmother, Stanisława, was a doctor's daughter from [[Riga]], [[Latvia]], and a member of the German-Polish von Mohl family.<ref>{{Cite book|oclc=982122195|title=Milosz: A Biography|last=Franaszek, Andrzej|pages=40}}</ref> The Miłosz estate was in [[Serbinai]], a name that Miłosz's biographer {{ill|Andrzej Franaszek|pl|Andrzej Franaszek}} has suggested could indicate Serbian origin; it is possible the Miłosz family originated in Serbia and settled in present-day Lithuania after being expelled from Germany centuries earlier.<ref>{{Cite book|oclc=982122195|title=Milosz: A Biography|last=Franaszek, Andrzej|pages=38}}</ref> Miłosz's father was born and educated in Riga. Miłosz's mother was born in Šeteniai and educated in Kraków.<ref>{{Cite book|oclc=982122195|title=Milosz: A Biography|last=Franaszek, Andrzej|pages=36}}</ref>

Despite this noble lineage, Miłosz's childhood on his maternal grandfather's estate in Šeteniai lacked the trappings of wealth or the customs of the upper class.<ref>{{Cite book|oclc=982122195|title=Milosz: A Biography|last=Franaszek, Andrzej|pages=34}}</ref> He memorialized his childhood in a 1955 novel, ''{{ill|The Issa Valley|lt=The Issa Valley|pl|Dolina Issy (powieść)}}'', and a 1959 memoir, ''{{ill|Native Realm|lt=Native Realm|pl|Rodzinna Europa}}.'' In these works, he described the influence of his Catholic grandmother, Jozefa, his burgeoning love for literature, and his early awareness, as a member of the Polish gentry in Lithuania, of the role of class in society.
[[File:Jacek Dehnel collection - Czesław Miłosz i studenci Uniwersytetu Stefana Batorego w Wilnie P-1158 01.jpg|thumb|400x400px|Czesław Miłosz, third row from top and fourth from left, with fellow students, [[Stefan Batory University]], [[Wilno]], 1930]]
Miłosz's early years were marked by upheaval. When his father was hired to work on infrastructure projects in [[Siberia]], he and his mother traveled to be with him.<ref>{{Cite book|oclc=982122195|title=Milosz: A Biography|last=Franaszek, Andrzej|pages=15}}</ref> After [[World War I]] broke out in 1914, Miłosz's father was conscripted into the Russian army, tasked with engineering roads and bridges for troop movements. Miłosz and his mother were sheltered in [[Vilnius]] when the German army captured it in 1915. Afterward, they once again joined Miłosz's father, following him as the front moved further into Russia, where, in 1917, Miłosz's brother, [[Andrzej Miłosz|Andrzej]], was born.<ref>{{Cite book|oclc=982122195|title=Milosz: A Biography|last=Franaszek, Andrzej|pages=17–20}}</ref> Finally, after moving through Estonia and Latvia, the family returned to Šeteniai in 1918. But the [[Polish–Soviet War]] broke out in 1919, during which Miłosz's father was involved in a [[1919 Polish coup d'état attempt in Lithuania|failed attempt]] to incorporate the newly independent Lithuania into the [[Second Polish Republic]], resulting in his expulsion from Lithuania and the family's move to what was then known as [[Vilnius|Wilno]], which had come [[Wilno Voivodeship (1926–1939)|under Polish control]] after the [[Polish–Lithuanian War]] of 1920.<ref>{{Cite book|oclc=982122195|title=Milosz: A Biography|last=Franaszek, Andrzej|pages=45}}</ref> The Polish-Soviet War continued, forcing the family to move again. At one point during the conflict, Polish soldiers fired at Miłosz and his mother, an episode he recounted in ''Native Realm.''<ref>{{Cite book|oclc=982122195|title=Milosz: A Biography|last=Franaszek, Andrzej|pages=46}}</ref> The family returned to Wilno after the war ended in 1921.

Despite the interruptions of wartime wanderings, Miłosz proved to be an exceptional student with a facility for languages. He ultimately learned Polish, Lithuanian, Russian, English, French, and Hebrew.<ref>{{cite news|title= Czeslaw Milosz, Poet and Nobelist Who Wrote of Modern Cruelties, Dies at 93| url=https://www.nytimes.com/2004/08/15/books/czeslaw-milosz-poet-and-nobelist-who-wrote-of-modern-cruelties-dies-at-93.html| access-date=17 March 2017|work=The New York Times|first=Raymond H.|last=Anderson|date=15 August 2004}}</ref> After graduation from [[Sigismund Augustus Gymnasium in Vilnius|Sigismund Augustus Gymnasium]] in Wilno, he entered [[Vilnius University#1918–1939|Stefan Batory University]] in 1929 as a law student. While at university, Miłosz joined a student group called {{ill|Academic Club of Wilno Wanderers and Intellectuals|lt=Academic Club of Wilno Wanderers and Intellectuals|pl|Akademicki Klub Włóczęgów Wileńskich)}} and a student poetry group called {{ill|Żagary|pl|Żagary}}, along with the young poets [[Jerzy Zagórski]], [[Teodor Bujnicki]], {{ill|Aleksander Rymkiewicz|pl|Aleksander Rymkiewicz}}, [[Jerzy Putrament]], and {{ill|Józef Maśliński|pl|Józef Maśliński}}.<ref name="hope">''Between Anxiety and Hope: The Poetry and Writing of Czeslaw Milosz'' by Edward Możejko. University of Alberta Press, 1988. pp 2f.</ref> His first published poems appeared in the university's student magazine in 1930.<ref name=":1" />

In 1931, he visited Paris, where he first met his distant cousin, [[Oscar Milosz]], a French-language poet of Lithuanian descent who had become a [[Swedenborgian]]. Oscar became a mentor and inspiration.<ref>{{Cite book|title=The Poet's Work : An Introduction to Czeslaw Milosz|last=Nathan, Leonard and|first=Quinn, Arthur.|date=1991|publisher=Harvard University Press|isbn=978-0674689695|location=Cambridge, Mass.|pages=93–95|oclc=23015782}}</ref> Returning to Wilno, Miłosz's early awareness of class difference and sympathy for those less fortunate than himself inspired his defense of Jewish students at the university who were being harassed by an anti-Semitic mob. Stepping between the mob and the Jewish students, Miłosz fended off attacks. One student was killed when a rock was thrown at his head.<ref>{{Cite book|oclc=982122195|title=Milosz: A Biography|last=Franaszek, Andrzej|pages=88–89}}</ref>

Miłosz's first volume of poetry, ''{{ill|A Poem on Frozen Time|pl|Poemat o czasie zastygłym}}'', was published in Polish in 1933. In the same year, he publicly read his poetry at an anti-racist "Poetry of Protest" event in Wilno, occasioned by [[Adolf Hitler|Hitler's]] rise to power in Germany.<ref>{{Cite book|oclc=982122195|title=Milosz: A Biography|last=Franaszek, Andrzej|pages=88}}</ref> In 1934, he graduated with a law degree, and the poetry group Żagary disbanded. Miłosz relocated to Paris on a scholarship to study for one year and write articles for a newspaper back in Wilno. In Paris, he frequently met with his cousin Oscar.<ref>{{Cite book|title=Milosz: A Biography|last=Franaszek, Andrzej|pages=129|oclc=982122195}}</ref>

By 1936, he had returned to Wilno, where he worked on literary programs at [[Polish Radio Wilno]]. His second poetry collection, ''[[Three Winters]]'', was published that same year, eliciting from one critic a comparison to [[Adam Mickiewicz]].<ref>{{Cite book|oclc=982122195|title=Milosz: A Biography|last=Franaszek, Andrzej|pages=151}}</ref> After only one year at Radio Wilno, Miłosz was dismissed due to an accusation that he was a left-wing sympathizer: as a student, he had adopted socialist views from which, by then, he had publicly distanced himself, and he and his boss, {{ill|Tadeusz Byrski|pl|Tadeusz Byrski}}, had produced programming that included performances by Jews and Byelorussians, which angered right-wing nationalists. After Byrski made a trip to the Soviet Union, an anonymous complaint was lodged with the management of Radio Wilno that the station housed a communist cell, and Byrski and Miłosz were dismissed.<ref>{{Cite book|oclc=982122195|title=Milosz: A Biography|last=Franaszek, Andrzej|pages=162–163}}</ref> In summer 1937, Miłosz moved to Warsaw, where he found work at [[Polskie Radio|Polish Radio]] and met his future wife, {{ill|Janina Miłosz|lt=Janina|pl|Janina Miłosz}} (née Dłuska; 1909–1986), who was at the time married to another man.<ref>{{Cite book|title=Milosz: A Biography|last=Franaszek, Andrzej|pages=171|oclc=982122195}}</ref>

===World War II===
Miłosz was in Warsaw when [[Siege of Warsaw (1939)|it was bombarded]] as part of the [[Invasion of Poland|German invasion of Poland]] in September 1939. Along with colleagues from Polish Radio, he escaped the city, making his way to [[Lviv|Lwów]]. But when he learned that Janina had remained in Warsaw with her parents, he looked for a way back. The [[Soviet invasion of Poland]] thwarted his plans, and, to avoid the incoming [[Red Army]], he fled to [[Bucharest]]. There he obtained a Lithuanian identity document and Soviet visa that allowed him to travel by train to Kyiv and then Wilno. After the Red Army invaded Lithuania, he procured fake documents that he used to enter the part of German-occupied Poland the Germans had dubbed the "[[General Government]]". It was a difficult journey, mostly on foot, that ended in summer 1940. Finally back in Warsaw, he reunited with Janina.<ref>{{Cite book|oclc=982122195|title=Milosz: A Biography|last=Franaszek, Andrzej|pages=180–190}}</ref>

Like many Poles at the time, to evade notice by German authorities, Miłosz participated in underground activities. For example, with higher education officially forbidden to Poles, he attended [[Education in Poland during World War II|underground lectures]] by [[Władysław Tatarkiewicz]], the Polish philosopher and historian of philosophy and aesthetics.<ref>{{Cite book|title=Memoirs|last=Tatarkiewicz|first=Wladyslaw|publisher=Panstwowy Instytut Wydawniczy|year=1979|isbn=978-83-06-00102-0|location=Warsaw|pages=171}}</ref> He translated [[William Shakespeare|Shakespeare's]] ''[[As You Like It]]'' and [[T. S. Eliot]]'s ''[[The Waste Land]]'' into Polish. Along with his friend the novelist [[Jerzy Andrzejewski]], he also arranged for the publication of his third volume of poetry, ''{{ill|Poems (Miłosz)|lt=Poems|pl|Wiersze (Czesław Miłosz)}}'', under a pseudonym in September 1940. The pseudonym was "Jan Syruć" and the title page said the volume had been published by a fictional press in Lwów in 1939; in fact, it may have been the first [[Polish underground press|clandestine book]] published in occupied Warsaw.<ref>{{Cite book|oclc=982122195|title=Milosz: A Biography|last=Franaszek, Andrzej|pages=202}}</ref> In 1942, Miłosz arranged for the publication of an anthology of Polish poets, ''Invincible Song: Polish Poetry of War Time'', by an underground press.<ref>{{Cite book|oclc=982122195|title=Milosz: A Biography|last=Franaszek, Andrzej|pages=203}}</ref>[[File:Andrzej Milosz and Czeslaw Milosz.jpg|thumb|190px|Czesław Miłosz ''(right)'' with brother Andrzej Miłosz at [[PEN Club]] World Congress, [[Warsaw]], May 1999]]

Miłosz's riskiest underground wartime activity was aiding Jews in Warsaw, which he did through an underground socialist organization called Freedom. His brother, Andrzej, was also [[Rescue of Jews by Poles during the Holocaust|active in helping Jews in Nazi-occupied Poland]]; in 1943, Andrzej transported the Polish Jew Seweryn Tross and his wife from Vilnius to Warsaw. Miłosz took in the Trosses, found them a hiding place, and supported them financially. The Trosses ultimately died during the [[Warsaw Uprising]]. Miłosz helped at least three other Jews in similar ways: Felicja Wołkomińska and her brother and sister.<ref name=":4">{{Cite web|url=http://db.yadvashem.org/righteous/family.html?language=en&itemId=4044933|title=Yad Vashem Institute Database of Righteous Among the Nations: Milosz Family|website=yadvashem.org|access-date=2019-04-10}}</ref>

Despite his willingness to engage in underground activity and vehement opposition to the Nazis, Miłosz did not join the Polish [[Home Army]]. In later years, he explained that this was partly out of an instinct for self-preservation and partly because he saw its leadership as right-wing and dictatorial.<ref name="dublin">{{cite web|url=http://www.drb.ie/essays/apples-at-world-s-end|title=Apples at World's End|author=Enda O'Doherty|publisher=[[Dublin Review of Books]]|access-date=5 June 2014|archive-date=7 June 2014|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140607000131/http://www.drb.ie/essays/apples-at-world-s-end|url-status=dead}}</ref> He also did not participate in the planning or execution of the Warsaw Uprising. According to Polish literary historian [[Irena Grudzińska-Gross]], he saw the uprising as a "doomed military effort" and lacked the "patriotic elation" for it. He called the uprising "a blameworthy, lightheaded enterprise",<ref name="dublin" /><ref>{{cite web|url=http://aseees.org/newsnet/2012-08.pdf|title=The Year of Czesław Miłosz|date=August 2012|publisher=[[Association for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies]]|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130918140736/http://aseees.org/newsnet/2012-08.pdf|archive-date=18 September 2013}}</ref> but later criticized the [[Red Army]] for failing to support it when it had the opportunity to do so.<ref>{{Cite book|title=The Captive Mind|last=Milosz|first=Czeslaw|publisher=Vintage International|year=1990|location=New York|pages=169}}</ref>
[[File:German Brennkommando-firing Warsaw 1944.jpg|left|thumb|200px|German troops setting fire to [[Warsaw]] buildings, 1944]]
As German troops began torching Warsaw buildings in August 1944, Miłosz was captured and held in a prisoner transit camp; he was later rescued by a Catholic nun—a stranger to him—who pleaded with the Germans on his behalf.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.poetryfoundation.org/articles/69162/the-doubter-and-the-saint|title=The Doubter and the Saint|last=Haven|first=Cynthia|date=2008-11-20|website=Poetry Foundation|language=en|access-date=2019-10-29}}</ref> Once freed, he and Janina escaped the city, ultimately settling in a village outside Kraków, where they were staying when the Red Army swept through Poland in January 1945, after [[Destruction of Warsaw|Warsaw had been largely destroyed]].<ref>{{Cite book|oclc=982122195|title=Milosz: A Biography|last=Franaszek, Andrzej|pages=223}}</ref>

In the preface to his 1953 book ''[[The Captive Mind]]'', Miłosz wrote, "I do not regret those years in Warsaw, which was, I believe, the most agonizing spot in the whole of terrorized Europe. Had I then chosen emigration, my life would certainly have followed a very different course. But my knowledge of the crimes which Europe has witnessed in the twentieth century would be less direct, less concrete than it is".<ref>{{Cite book|title=The Captive Mind|last=Milosz|first=Czeslaw|publisher=Vintage International|year=1990|location=New York|pages=vi–viii}}</ref> Immediately after the war, Miłosz published his fourth poetry collection, ''[[Rescue (Miłosz)|Rescue]]''; it focused on his wartime experiences and contains some of his most critically praised work, including the 20-poem cycle "The World," composed like a primer for naïve schoolchildren, and the cycle "Voices of Poor People". The volume also contains some of his most frequently anthologized poems, including "A Song on the End of the World", "{{ill|Campo dei Fiori (poem)|lt=Campo dei Fiori|it|Campo dei Fiori (poema)}}", and "A Poor Christian Looks at the Ghetto".

===Diplomatic career===
From 1945 to 1951, Miłosz served as a [[cultural attaché]] for the newly formed [[People's Republic of Poland]]. It was in this capacity that he first met [[Jane Zielonko]], the future translator of ''The Captive Mind'', with whom he had a brief relationship.<ref name=Roe9Nov2001>Roe, Nicholas (9 November 2001). [https://www.theguardian.com/books/2001/nov/10/poetry.artsandhumanities "A century's witness"]. ''The Guardian''.</ref><ref name=Biegajło2018p137>{{cite book |last1=Biegajło |first1=Bartłomiej |title=Totalitarian (In)Experience in Literary Works and Their Translations: Between East and West |date=2018 |publisher=Cambridge Scholars Publishing |location=Newcastle |page=[https://books.google.com/books?id=h_N0DwAAQBAJ&pg=PA137 137] |isbn=978-1-5275-1184-2}}</ref> He moved from [[New York City]] to [[Washington, D.C.]], and finally to Paris, organizing and promoting Polish cultural occasions such as musical concerts, art exhibitions, and literary and cinematic events. Although he was a representative of Poland, which had become a Soviet [[Satellite state|satellite country]] behind the [[Iron Curtain]], he was not a member of any communist party. In ''The Captive Mind'', he explained his reasons for accepting the role:<blockquote>My mother tongue, work in my mother tongue, is for me the most important thing in life. And my country, where what I wrote could be printed and could reach the public, lay within the Eastern Empire. My aim and purpose was to keep alive freedom of thought in my own special field; I sought in full knowledge and conscience to subordinate my conduct to the fulfillment of that aim. I served abroad because I was thus relieved from direct pressure and, in the material which I sent to my publishers, could be bolder than my colleagues at home. I did not want to become an émigré and so give up all chance of taking a hand in what was going on in my own country.<ref>{{Cite book|title=The Captive Mind|last=Milosz|first=Czeslaw|publisher=Vintage International|year=1990|location=New York|pages=x}}</ref></blockquote>Miłosz did not publish a book while he was a representative of the Polish government. Instead, he wrote articles for various Polish periodicals introducing readers to British and American writers like Eliot, [[William Faulkner]], [[Ernest Hemingway]], [[Norman Mailer]], [[Robert Lowell]], and [[W. H. Auden]]. He also translated into Polish Shakespeare's ''[[Othello]]'' and the work of [[Walt Whitman]], [[Carl Sandburg]], [[Pablo Neruda]], and others.<ref>{{Cite book|oclc=982122195|title=Milosz: A Biography|last=Franaszek, Andrzej|pages=261}}</ref>

In 1947, Miłosz's son, Anthony, was born in Washington, D.C.<ref name=":5" />

In 1948, Miłosz arranged for the Polish government to fund a Department of Polish Studies at [[Columbia University]]. Named for Adam Mickiewicz, the department featured lectures by [[Manfred Kridl]], Miłosz's friend who was then on the faculty of [[Smith College]], and produced a scholarly book about Mickiewicz. Mickiewicz's granddaughter wrote a letter to [[Dwight D. Eisenhower]], then the president of Columbia University, to express her approval, but the [[Polish American Congress]], an influential group of Polish émigrés, denounced the arrangement in a letter to Eisenhower that they shared with the press, which alleged a communist infiltration at Columbia. Students picketed and called for boycotts. One faculty member resigned in protest. Despite the controversy, the department was established, the lectures took place, and the book was produced, but the department was discontinued in 1954 when funding from Poland ceased.<ref>{{Cite book|oclc=982122195|title=Milosz: A Biography|last=Franaszek, Andrzej|pages=259–261}}</ref>

In 1949, Miłosz visited Poland for the first time since joining its diplomatic corps and was appalled by the conditions he saw, including an atmosphere of pervasive fear of the government. After returning to the U.S., he began to look for a way to leave his post, even soliciting advice from [[Albert Einstein]], whom he met in the course of his duties.<ref>{{Cite book|oclc=982122195|title=Milosz: A Biography|last=Franaszek, Andrzej|pages=266–270}}</ref>

As the Polish government, influenced by [[Joseph Stalin]], became more oppressive, his superiors began to view Miłosz as a threat: he was outspoken in his reports to Warsaw and met with people not approved by his superiors. Consequently, his superiors called him "an individual who ideologically is totally alien".<ref>{{Cite book|oclc=982122195|title=Milosz: A Biography|last=Franaszek, Andrzej|pages=277}}</ref> Toward the end of 1950, when Janina was pregnant with their second child, Miłosz was recalled to Warsaw, where in December 1950 his passport was confiscated, ostensibly until it could be determined that he did not plan to defect. After intervention by [[Ministry of Foreign Affairs (Poland)|Poland's foreign minister]], [[Zygmunt Modzelewski]], Miłosz's passport was returned. Realizing that he was in danger if he remained in Poland, Miłosz left for Paris in January 1951.<ref>{{Cite book|oclc=982122195|title=Milosz: A Biography|last=Franaszek, Andrzej|pages=281–283}}</ref>

=== Asylum in France ===
Upon arriving in Paris, Miłosz went into hiding, aided by the staff of the Polish émigré magazine ''[[Kultura]].''<ref>{{Cite book|oclc=982122195|title=Milosz: A Biography|last=Franaszek, Andrzej|pages=284–285}}</ref> With his wife and son still in the United States, he applied to enter the U.S. and was denied. At the time, the U.S. was in the grip of [[McCarthyism]], and influential Polish émigrés had convinced American officials that Miłosz was a communist.<ref>{{Cite book|oclc=982122195|title=Milosz: A Biography|last=Franaszek, Andrzej|pages=301}}</ref> Unable to leave France, Miłosz was not present for the birth of his second son, John Peter, in Washington, D.C., in 1951.<ref>{{Cite book|title=Milosz: A Biography|last=Franaszek, Andrzej|pages=283}}</ref>

With the United States closed to him, Miłosz requested—and was granted—[[Right of asylum|political asylum]] in France. After three months in hiding, he announced his defection at a press conference and in a ''Kultura'' article, "No", that explained his refusal to live in Poland or continue working for the Polish regime. He was the first artist of note from a communist country to make public his reasons for breaking ties with his government.<ref>{{Cite book|oclc=982122195|title=Milosz: A Biography|last=Franaszek, Andrzej|pages=286}}</ref> His case attracted attention in Poland, where his work was banned and he was attacked in the press, and in the West, where prominent individuals voiced criticism and support. For example, the future Nobel laureate Pablo Neruda, then a supporter of the [[Soviet Union]], attacked him in a communist newspaper as "The Man Who Ran Away". On the other hand, [[Albert Camus]], another future Nobel laureate, visited Miłosz and offered his support.<ref name="Haven2006">{{cite book|author=Cynthia L. Haven|title=Czesław Miłosz: Conversations|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=r-fXgmb5EmEC&pg=PA206|year=2006|publisher=Univ. Press of Mississippi|isbn=978-1-57806-829-6|page=206}}</ref> Another supporter during this period was the Swiss philosopher [[Jeanne Hersch]], with whom Miłosz had a brief romantic affair.<ref>{{Cite book|title=Milosz: A Biography|last=Franaszek|first=Andrzej|pages=312–318}}</ref>

Miłosz was finally reunited with his family in 1953, when Janina and the children joined him in France.<ref name="Franaszek, Andrzej 324">{{Cite book|oclc=982122195|title=Milosz: A Biography|last=Franaszek, Andrzej|pages=324}}</ref> That same year saw the publication of ''The Captive Mind'', a nonfiction work that uses case studies to dissect the methods and consequences of Soviet communism, which at the time had prominent admirers in the West. The book brought Miłosz his first readership in the United States, where it was credited by some on the political left (such as [[Susan Sontag]]) with helping to change perceptions about communism.<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://movies2.nytimes.com/books/00/03/12/specials/sontag-communism.html|title=Susan Sontag Provokes Debate on Communism|website=movies2.nytimes.com|access-date=2019-04-10}}</ref> The German philosopher [[Karl Jaspers]] described it as a "significant historical document".<ref>{{Cite journal|title=Endurance and Miracle: Review of The Captive Mind|last=Jaspers|first=Karl|date=6 June 1953|journal=The Saturday Review}}</ref> It became a staple of political science courses and is considered a classic work in the study of [[totalitarianism]].

Miłosz's years in France were productive. In addition to ''The Captive Mind'', he published two poetry collections (''[[Daylight (Miłosz)|Daylight]]'' (1954) and ''[[A Treatise on Poetry]]'' (1957)), two novels (''{{ill|The Seizure of Power|pl|Zdobycie władzy}}'' (1955) and ''The Issa Valley'' (1955)), and a memoir (''Native Realm'' (1959)). All were published in Polish by an émigré press in Paris.

Andrzej Franaszek has called ''A Treatise on Poetry'' Miłosz's magnum opus, while the scholar [[Helen Vendler]] compared it to ''[[The Waste Land]]'', a work "so powerful that it bursts the bounds in which it was written—the bounds of language, geography, epoch".<ref>{{Cite news|url=https://www.nybooks.com/articles/2001/05/31/a-lament-in-three-voices/|title=A Lament in Three Voices|last=Vendler|first=Helen|journal=New York Review of Books|date=2001-05-31|access-date=2019-04-10|language=en|issn=0028-7504}}</ref> A long poem divided into four sections, ''A Treatise on Poetry'' surveys Polish history, recounts Miłosz's experience of war, and explores the relationship between art and history.

In 1956, Miłosz and Janina were married.<ref name="Franaszek, Andrzej 324"/>{{Efn|There is evidence that Miłosz and Janina obtained a civil marriage certificate in Warsaw in 1944. World War II had separated Janina from her first husband, who was in London. This prevented them from obtaining a divorce, and they remained legally married. Miłosz and Janina had a church-sanctioned wedding in France in 1956 after her first husband died.<ref>{{Cite book|title=Milosz: A Biography|last=Franaszek, Andrzej|pages=323}}</ref>|name=marriage|group=lower-alpha}}