Miłosz and Elijah Cover Image

Miłosz i Eliasz
Miłosz and Elijah

Author(s): Adam Regiewicz
Subject(s): Studies of Literature
Published by: Instytut Badań Literackich Polskiej Akademii Nauk
Keywords: Czesław Miłosz; Miłosz's “Piosenka o końcu świata (A Song on the End of the World)"; Biblical prophet Elijah

Summary/Abstract: The article analyses Czesław Miłosz’s one of the most recognisable piece – “Piosenka o końcu świata (A Song on the End of the World).” The poem’s interpretation is directed on the context of the Apocalypse and Christian eschatology. The Jewish tradition, which belongs to omitted perspectives of analysis, proves vital due to the poet’s private contacts with and interests in Judaism and due to the poem’s subject referring to the end of the world. In Miłosz’s poem the point of reference is the Biblical prophet Elijah, a messianic figure signalling the final days. A more insightful reading of the two pieces – the Biblical and the poetic one – supported by exegesis leads to a conviction of a relation between the scene of Elijah’s expecting death and Czesław Miłosz’s lyrical situation of the poem.

  • Issue Year: 2018
  • Issue No: 3
  • Page Range: 93-106
  • Page Count: 14
  • Language: Polish
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