Brutalne wersy. Przemiany norm gatunkowych literackiego horroru a translatorskie strategie polskich popularyzatorów poezji grozy – przypadek antologii Roberta Stillera i Leszka Lachowieckiego
Violent Verses. Transformations of Horror Fiction and Translational Strategies of Polish Popularizers of Gothic Poetry – the Case Study of Anthologies by Robert Stiller and Leszek Lachowiecki

Summary/Abstract: The article discusses strategies used in translation of horror poetry in Polish anthologies of this genre in late 1980s and early 1990s when, thanks to political and social transformation, Western popculture with some of its characteristic features became available and popular in Poland. Comparative analysis of the selected translations collected in the volume Danse macabre (1993) by Leszek Lachowiecki, compared to their English, French or German originals (by Howard Phillips Lovecraft, Robert Frost, Richard Wilbur, Vachel Lindsay, Charles Baudelaire and Georg Heym) and earlier Polish versions by Robert Stiller (published in 1986), proves that the later variants amplify and/or introduce numerous lexical items denoting or connotating violence, fear and disgust. Thus, the techniques used by Lachowiecki – aimed at a brutalization of language and emphasising the themes of cruelty, terror and dread – can be perceived as an application of old-fashion style and means (typical for modernist or “Young Poland” literature) in order to adjust aesthetic standards used in poetry to broader cultural trends dominating in contemporary horror fiction.

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