The Last Wish
core collection 1993 The Witcher
Record
| Original title | Ostatnie życzenie |
|---|---|
| First published | 1993 |
| Original language |  PL |
| First English translation | 2007 |
| Translator | Danusia Stok |
| Work type | collection |
| Canon status | core |
| Reader rating | 4.14 (436,012 ratings, collected 2026-09-13) |
| Page count | 400 |
| First-edition ISBN | 9780575082441 |
| First-edition publisher | superNOWA |
| First-edition country | PL |
Synopsis
This 1993 collection opens with Geralt of Rivia, a witcher trained and magically altered from childhood to hunt monsters for coin, recuperating from injuries at a secluded temple after a violent encounter. As he heals, his conversations with the priestess Nenneke and his own memories unfold as a linked sequence of stories from his recent past, tied together by a recurring framing narrative called "The Voice of Reason." The individual tales send Geralt into towns and courts across a morally gray world, taking contracts against striga, genies, and other supernatural threats, often finding that the "monsters" are not the ones with claws. Along the way he crosses paths with the bard Dandelion, who narrates several of his exploits, and with King Foltest and the cursed Princess Pavetta at a fateful betrothal feast.
Where it sits
- Universe: The Witcher
- Series: The Witcher core; position 1 of 9 in the series' recorded order
- Author: Andrzej Sapkowski
Awards (verified)
- Premio Ignotus (Best Anthology), 2003: won; Spanish edition.
Notes
- Foundational collection, reading order #1 (registered Core under the collection-as-Core exception). superNOWA issued it to supersede the 1990 Reporter collection. New David French re-translation announced for 2026.
- From the series record (The Witcher): Reading order: collections first (official superNOWA numbering), then the 5-novel saga, then standalones. Polish and English publication orders both differ from reading order.
Neighbouring works
Publication order and internal chronology are tracked as two separate orderings and are never conflated: a book's place in one says nothing about its place in the other.
- Publication order, within the series The Witcher: position 2 of 9: previous Sword of Destiny (1992) · next Blood of Elves (1994)
Sources
← The Witcher dossier · All universes
Part of the Library. Fields without an identified source are omitted, never guessed.