The missing part of (literary) history Cover Image

Brakująca część historii (literatury). O książce Marty Baron-Milian Wat plus VAT
The missing part of (literary) history

Author(s): Jakub Skurtys
Subject(s): Language and Literature Studies, Studies of Literature, Polish Literature
Published by: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Jagiellońskiego
Keywords: Baron-Milian Marta; Wat Aleksander; literature and economy; twentieth-century literature

Summary/Abstract: The article is a review of Marta Baron-Milian’s Wat plus VAT, the first monograph about connections between economy and literature in Aleksander Wat’s work. The author tries to show Baron’s book as a part of wider phenomenon, which can be observed after the great crisis in 2008, as a result of returning of different humanistic approaches to the problems of capitalist economy. By analyzing “economic consciousnessˮ and literary strategies of Aleksander Wat (in his poetry, biography, short stories and essays), Baron reveals the theological, symbolic and linguistic basis of modern economy. It allows her to describe a specific literary “experience of economy” and penetrating analyze of main themes of Wat’s work. One of the aims of the review is to rethink Baron’s proposition as a part of the new, thematically orientated history of polish modern literature. The other is to check, if Wat’s and Baron’s strictly modern and humanistic view of the economic systems can be still subversive and helpful against postmodern, mathematically reinforced capitalistic rhetoric.

  • Issue Year: 2015
  • Issue No: 26
  • Page Range: 109-123
  • Page Count: 15
  • Language: Polish