Mickiewicz ukryty za Słowackim? Nota o trój-antagonizmie wieszczów w „Psalmie żalu”
Krasińskiego Mickiewicz Hidden behind Słowacki? A Note about Tri-Antagonism between the Bards in Krasiński’s “Psalm żalu” [“Psalm of Sorrow”]

Summary/Abstract: The author, describing ideological polemics conducted between three most important Polish Romantic poets, modifies the notion of the “antagonism between the bards” (typically reserved for the dispute between Słowacki and Mickiewicz) by proposing the concept of “tri-antagonism”. The matter is explained on the example of an analysis of conceptual senses (political, religious, historiosophical) inscribed in “Psalm żalu” [“Psalm of Sorrow”], a work by Krasiński from the period of the Spring of Nations (1848), which was commonly and rightly interpreted as Krasiński’s (an opponent of revolution) last word in a dispute with Słowacki (who proclaimed the idea of the “Spirit − the Eternal Revolutionary”). The author puts forward a thesis that Mickiewicz − with whom Krasiński led a dramatic dispute in Rome in 1848 over the Spring of Nations and the direction of the actions of the Polish community − is also the hidden negative hero of the work. Krasiński referred to this dispute in detail and in a very subjective way in letters to people close to him (including his lover, Delfina Potocka, and the philosopher August Cieszkowski). The author of this article shows that the arguments used by Krasiński in his polemic have been repeated in the “Psalm of Sorrow” and that in the negative portrait of the revolutionary “we” he included the features and thoughts attributed in those letters to Mickiewicz. Thus, the author argues, the dispute between Mickiewicz and Krasiński in 1848 should be regarded as a key element in the genesis of the analysed work.

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