Zbigniew Herbert was born on 29 October 1924 in Lviv, to an intelligentsia family with Polish and Armenian roots. As a child, he was interested in literature and art, which was nurtured by his parents. His youth coincided with the tragic period of the Second World War, which interrupted his peaceful family life and forced Herbert to grow up in extreme conditions. Lviv was occupied by Soviet troops and then by Nazi Germany, which had a profound effect on his world view and future work.

After the war, Herbert, like many Poles from the Borderlands, had to leave Lviv. He settled in Krakow, where he began to study economics at the Academy of Commerce and then took up law studies at the Jagiellonian University. He also moved to Toruń to study philosophy at the Nicolaus Copernicus University. This was a time of intensive study and intellectual exploration that had a profound influence on his future literary work. During this period, Herbert became interested in classical history, culture and philosophy, which would later be reflected in his works.

He made his debut in 1956 with the volume Strings of Light, which was published during the so-called thaw after October 1956, when there was a relative loosening of communist censorship. Herbert quickly gained recognition as an independent poet, unyielding to propaganda and ideological compromises. His subsequent volumes of poetry, including Hermes, Dog and Star (1957) and Subject Study (1961), cemented his position as one of the most important voices in Polish literature. Herbert was the author of many essays, including 'Barbarians in the Garden' (1962), the fruit of his travels in Europe, where he was fascinated by Mediterranean art, history and culture.

Throughout the 1960s and 1970s, Herbert left Poland many times, travelling around Western Europe and the United States, where he lectured at universities and met with representatives of Western intellectual circles. His poems were steeped in classical approaches to ethics, respect for tradition and principles, as well as criticism of totalitarianism and resistance to tyranny - these themes made him one of the greatest moral poets of the 20th century. The symbolic figure of his poetry became Pan Cogito, the hero of a cycle of poems in which the author analysed the human condition and the moral dilemmas of man in times of crisis of values.

After returning to Poland in the 1990s, Herbert continued his work, publishing further volumes of poetry, including Rovigo (1992) and Epilog burzy (1998). He was also an active commentator on public life, heavily involved in the Polish intellectual debate. He received many literary awards, both at home and abroad, including the international Herder Prize and the Jurzykowski Prize.

Zbigniew Herbert died on 28 July 1998 in Warsaw, leaving behind a rich literary oeuvre that became an inspiration to subsequent generations. His work, centred on ethical values, classical culture and an unyielding stance against evil, continues to be an important testimony to readers around the world.