Maciej Zembaty

Maciej Zembaty (16 May 1944 – 27 June 2011[1]) was a Polish artist, writer, journalist, singer, poet and comedian.

Despite being considered one of the classics of Polish black humour, he is perhaps best known as a translator and populariser of songs and poems by Leonard Cohen.

In 1972, together with Jacek Janczarski, he created the story of Poszepszyński Family, one of the best-known and longest-running comic series ever aired in the Polish Radio.

In several months he created a dozen or so translations, most of which became hits in Poland even before the original songs by Cohen became available and known to wider audience.

In addition, Zembaty published a number of books with translations of Cohen's poetry, some of them in official printing houses, while other unofficially in the samizdat.