STAFF, LEOPOLD

born Sept. 14, 1878, Lww, Pol. [now Lviv, Ukraine] died May 31, 1957, Skarzysko-Kamienna, Pol. influential poet associated with the Young Poland movement at the end of the 19th century. After completing his education at Lww University, Staff moved to Krakw. In 1901 his Sny o potedze (Dreams of Power), the first of his more than 30 volumes of verse, was published in Warsaw; two years later Dzien duszy (1903; The Day of the Soul) appeared. From the very beginning Staff showed a talent for handling poetic form; he would create new forms if the old seemed insufficient. A later collection, Ucho igielne (1927; The Needle's Eye), was dominated by religious feeling, expressed in concise and direct verse. His last collection of poems appeared in 1954. Staff also made translations and wrote some dramas, though this work is less well-known than his poetry.