Auschwitz as the Metaphor for Everything. Wojciech Albiński’s „Oświęcimki” Cover Image

Auschwitz jest metaforą wszystkiego. Przypadek „Oświęcimków” Wojciecha Albińskiego
Auschwitz as the Metaphor for Everything. Wojciech Albiński’s „Oświęcimki”

Author(s): Joanna Nazimek
Subject(s): Language and Literature Studies, Studies of Literature, Polish Literature, Culture and social structure , History of the Holocaust, Theory of Literature
Published by: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Śląskiego
Keywords: "Oświęcimki" by Wojciech Albiński; Holocaust; Auschwitz; collective memory; post-memory; post‑traumatic culture

Summary/Abstract: The object of analysis in this article is the short prose collection entitled “Oświęcimki” (2014). Wojciech Albiński’s pieces reveal how strongly war and Holocaust clichés are rooted in the dictionary, gestures and collective bodily memory of contemporary generations. These texts can be also read as the critiques of the pop‑cultural infantilisation of the Shoah and the signs of tiredness due to the excess of traumatising testimonies on the events of World War II. As the author endeavours to demonstrate, Albiński’s texts reveal the empathetic unease and the real needs of approaching the past, understanding it, and searching for sense in it. “Oświęcimki” are analysed in the context of the issues connected with the functioning of the Holocaust in the permanently changing collective memory.

  • Issue Year: 2016
  • Issue No: 2
  • Page Range: 283-294
  • Page Count: 12
  • Language: Polish