The Polish novelist and short-story writer Henryk Sienkiewicz (1846-1916) wrote historical novels on an epic scale. His evocations of the Middle Ages and the 17th century, as well as the early Christian era, are vivid, stirring, and often beautiful.

Born on May 4, 1846, in Wola Okrzejska in Russian-occupied Poland, Henryk Sienkiewicz enjoyed a peaceful childhood in the country, encountering the conflicts of his divided land only when his family moved to Warsaw and the boy began secondary school. An average student, Sienkiewicz graduated to a post as tutor in a wealthy family before returning to Warsaw University; there he hesitated between medicine and law, finally transferring to the faculty of history and literature. He left the university in 1871 without taking his examinations. During the next 5 years Sienkiewicz painfully established himself as a free-lance writer and journalist. He distinguished himself as a chronicle writer, a popular reporting genre that took...