Topografia mityzacji i rytuały lektury
The topography of mythization and ritual of reading The review of Dorota Siwor, Tropy mitu i rytuału. O polskiej prozie współczesnej – nie tylko najnowszej [Traces of Myth and Ritual On Contemporary Polish Prose]

Summary/Abstract: The article is a review of Dorota Siwor’s monography entitled Traces of Myth and Ritual On Contemporary Polish Prose (Tropy mitu i rytuału. O polskiej prozie współczesnej – nie tylko najnowszej). The affinities between literature and myth (and the ritual that is associated with myth) are analysed in this book from several perspectives – those of structure, theme, and function. Dorota Siwor’s interpretations generally focus on Polish prose composed in the second half of the twentieth century and the first several years of the twenty-first century (the literary works written by Andrzej Stasiuk, Olga Tokarczuk, Wilhelm Dichter, but also by Czesław Miłosz, Tadeusz Konwicki, Tadeusz Nowak and others). Essays included in this book are interpretative, but some of them also offer a systematic account. In this monograph, the main problem – the mythization strategy in prose – is explained as a type of search (search for order in the surrounding world, search for the origins and search for oneself). The analyses in mythical and ritualistic contexts highlight the interesting tendencies in prose but also show some kind of different topography (topography of mythization) and ritual of reading (not only private but also more universal).

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