Ironia romantyczna w pisarstwie Paula de Mana
Romantic Irony in Paul de Man’s Writing

Summary/Abstract: Romantic irony is subject of reflection mainly in Paul de Man’s two pieces, namely "The Rhetoric of Temporality and The Concept of Irony". The aim of the article is to indicate that many structures of thinking derived from the key aesthetic structure of Early German Romanticism also act in the deconstructionist’s other writings. In this mode the romantic irony becomes a hero – often unnamed, but important – of de Man’s most crucial arguments presenting his aporia-centered concept of language and literature. The article also takes up the issue of de Man writings’ reception; it seems that incomprehension or open reluctance they often evoke stem from their too-literal reading. De Man, by contrast, though often in a veiled way, demands from his audience a non-literal reading (in line with the assumed non-obviousness of the borderline between literature and criticism), while irony for de Man is not only a subject of research, but a writing method itself strongly inspired by the creativity of the Romantics.

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