Pół głosem, pół pismem
Half in Speech, Half in Writing

On the New Edition of Aleksander Wat’s “Dziennik bez samogłosek” (“Diary without Vowels”)

Summary/Abstract: The article is an attempt at analysing the phenomenon of “Dziennik bez samogłosek” (“Diary without Vowels”) from the perspective of the text’s materiality. The subject was undertaken as a result of the diary’s Michalina Kmiecik’s new edition which for the first time allows to insight into Wat’s original typescript and into its new reading unmediated by Ola Watowa’s interventions. The reflection’s starting point is a confrontation of the various interpretations and scholarly remarks on the form of “Diary without Vowels”, all being both possibly different answers to settle the problem of specificity of Wat’s use of the code and to expound the reasons the poet makes such a choice. The analysis of the form ultimately prompts to resolve the issue on the level of Wat’s constant confrontation with the avant-garde. From this perspective the code is seen rather as a peculiar experiment in which lexical material remains in direct connection with (avant-garde in its nature) mistrust to language, an effort to defragment language and passion for destruction.

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