[7] The poet's father, Bolesław (half-blooded Armenian),[8] was a soldier in the Polish Legions during World War I and a defender of Lwów; he was a lawyer and worked as a bank manager.

After the German and Soviet invasion and subsequent occupation of Lwów, he continued his studies at the secret meetings organized by the Polish underground, where he graduated and passed the A-level exam (matura) in January 1944.

of the communist rules enforced by the Soviet Union on Poland (arguably the best artistic expression of this disgust is contained in his poem "The Power of Taste").

His first lively impressions from his trips and reflections triggered by the direct contact with the cultural heritage of the Western Europe were enclosed in the essay "The Barbarian in the Garden" (Barbarzyńca w Ogrodzie, 1962).

From September 1970 to June 1971, the Herberts again stayed in the U.S., where the poet gave lectures as a visiting professor at California State University, Los Angeles.

At that time, he got involved in pro-democracy actions initiated by writer circles – he was one of the signatories of 'List 17' ('Letter of 17') which supported civil rights of the members of an openly anti-communist organization, The Movement (Ruch).

[33] Herbert came back to Poland at the beginning of 1981 – in the short period of the legal existence of Solidarity, the only independent mass organization in the Soviet bloc.

The fierce anti-communist journalism of Tygodnik Solidarność (1994, # 41) and supporting the statement of the editorial office of Arka magazine about the decommunisation of the elites stoked the controversy among Herbert's opposition friends.

He praised the Cold War anti-communist spy Colonel Ryszard Kukliński in an open letter to then president Lech Wałęsa in 1994, and later also expressed support for the Chechen Dzjochar Dudajev.

What is more, he supported the investigation of Liga Republikańska (Republican League) in the case of assassination of Stanisław Pyjas and advocated revealing the UB (Office of Security) files from 1956.

In 1994 in the interview for Tygodnik Solidarność he criticized not only the Round Table Agreement and the politics of the Third Polish Republic (III Rzeczpospolita), but also accused some prominent public figures, such as Czesław Miłosz and Adam Michnik as being personally responsible for the country's difficulties.

The Dutch newspaper NRC Handelsblad invited Herbert to visit this exhibition because he wrote a book with essays about the "Golden age" of the Netherlands.

[citation needed] In 1983 the Literary Institute in Paris published another book of poetry by Herbert entitled Raport z oblężonego Miasta i inne wiersze (Report from a Besieged City and Other Poems).

In his literary output the past is not treated as something distant or closed – revived characters and events make possible an attempt at understanding not only history but also the current moment.

The ethical base of Herbert's artistic work constitutes the conviction that the justice of a particular matter, and the actions taken in its defence, do not depend on the chance of victory.

Characteristic of the contemporary world is a fuzzy borderline between good and evil, the degeneration of language, which deprives words of their clear-cut nature, and the common debasement of values.

Compared to the poems from Epilog Burzy (Epilogue to the Storm) and his previous works, Puste Niebo Pana Cogito was not well received by critics.

In his works he presents a perspective of 'intellectual reflection', with a stress on human beings and their dignity, on the background of history, where people are almost irrelevant cogs in the machine of fate.

But it is a one-sided classicism (....) In a way, Herbert's poetry is typical of the whole Polish attitude to their position within the communist bloc; independent, brilliant, ironic, wary, a bit contemptuous, pained."

– A. Alvarez, Under Pressure (1965)"If the key to contemporary Polish poetry is the selective experience of the last decades, Herbert is perhaps the most skillful in expressing it and can be called a poet of historical irony.

– Czesław Miłosz, Postwar Polish Poetry (3rd ed., 1983)"There is little doubt that at this writing Zbigniew Herbert is the most admired and respected poet now living in Poland.

(...) Polish readers have always revered poets who succeed in defining the nation's spiritual dilemma; what is exceptional in Herbert is that his popularity at home is matched by a wide acclaim abroad."

In a talk given at a conference organized by the journal "Odra" he said: "So not having pretensions to infallibility, but stating only my predilections, I would like to say that in contemporary poetry the poems that appeal to me the most are those in which I discern something I would call a quality of semantic transparency (a term borrowed from Husserl's logic).

The latter starts with prehistory, in the Lascaux caves, and travels through the age of Greek and Roman antiquity, the days of Gothic cathedrals, Renaissance painting and sentimental gardens.

But people still arouse Herbert's interest – not only painters, but also those who were buying and often ordering their works – since Dutch painting is typical of a certain civilization and could not exist in any other place or time.

Although written much earlier than Martwa natura z wędzidłem, the last volume of essays Labirynt nad morzem (Labyrinth on the Sea-Shore) was published only after the poet's death.

Labirynt nad morzem consists mainly of essays devoted to ancient Greek culture and history, as well as in a lesser degree to the Etruscans and the Roman legionnaires from Hadrian's wall.

One can be deprived of everything that matters in life, as a result of inhuman regulations and human stupidity (Listy naszych czytelników (Letters From Our Readers)).

A historian from the Instytut Pamięci Narodowej Rafał Sierchuła speculates that the communist government in Poland may have made active attempts to prevent them from receiving the prize, due to their anti-communist opinions.

[59] From May 2024, some Herbert′s manuscripts (poems The Message of Mr Cogito, Nike Who Hesitates and Elegy of Fortinbras) are presented at a permanent exhibition in the Palace of the Commonwealth.