Potęgowanie agonu, czyli o literackim starciu Józefa Albina Herbaczewskiego z Tadeuszem Micińskim
Intensifying the Agon: A Comment on the Confrontation between Józef Albin Herbaczewski and Tadeusz Miciński

Summary/Abstract: The subject of reflection in this article is one of the most spectacular clashes in the Young Poland arena. The confrontation was initiated by Józef Albin Herbaczewski (Juozapas Albinas Herbačiauskas), a bilingual Lithuanian writer, who in the early twentieth century was connected with the artistic and scientific community of Kraków and was an active journalist writing on the topic of Polish-Lithuanian relations. His adversary was Tadeusz Miciński, a Young Poland poet, playwright, and prose writer, similarly to Herbaczewski committed to the national revival of Poland and Lithuania. The author of the article tries to find an answer to the question why, despite a clear conceptual and ideological affinity, as well as a certain closeness of artistic attitudes and aesthetic choices, the two writers entered into an intense conflict with one another. Unveiling the backstage of the Lithuanian author’s adoption of a revisionist stance towards Miciński, the article also refers to Bloom’s theory of the “anxiety of influence”. The intensification of the agon referred to in the title means both a growing tension in mutual relations, which will translate into subsequent literary skirmishes, and the multi-objectivity of this writers’ duel (including the indirect participation of Stanisław Tarnowski).

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