!["The Collectors of Impressions". On Literature of the Freed Generation.](/api/image/getissuecoverimage?id=picture_2005_304.jpg)
"The Collectors of Impressions". On Literature of the Freed Generation.
"Kolekcjonerzy wrażeń". O literaturze wyzwolonej generacji
Keywords: Contemporary Polish Literature
More...Keywords: Contemporary Polish Literature
More...Keywords: Literature of the Holocaust; representation; narrativism
A review of: A. Ziębińska-Witek, 2005, Holocaust. Problemy przedstawiania, Lublin: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Marii Skłodowskiej-Curie.
More...Keywords: Miron Białoszewski; Polish literature; methodology; hermeneutics; literary criticism
A review of: A. Gleń, 2004, "W tej latarni". Późna twórczość Mirona Białoszewskiego w perspektywie hermeneutycznej, Opole: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Opolskiego.
More...Keywords: Brodsky; poetry; criticism; language
The present article discusses the Russian-born poet's fascinations with the English language and how he gradually switched into it in his prose output, translated his own poems into, and eventually wrote them in, English. The Author also discusses the change in the critics' views, initially reluctant as they were, on that "captivation" of the language the poet was to learn only in his adult years. Brodsky's attitude toward English is set within the context of his parting with the history of his family and is deemed to be an instance of effort to overcome a "visitor's unilinguality".
More...Keywords: Krystyna Kłosińska; Feminism; Author; Reader; Literature; Reality.
Book review: Krystyna Kłosińska, Miniatury. Czytanie i pisanie „kobiece” [‘Miniatures. “Female” reading and writing’,] Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Śląskiego, Katowice, 2006. The reviewer considers the extent to which the feminist thought, existing in culture concurrently as an ideology and a set of critical tools, spreads itself against the background of post-structuralist thought, as a broad literary-studies concept, mainly the one classed as the theory of reading. Thus, an attempt is made at replying to the questions: What is the place that the author/reader situates her own feminist discourse? Is it possible to practice a ‘pure’ feminist thought? And, isn’t it so that Kłosińska’s texts incite one to reflect upon feminism as one of the methods of viewing literature and reality as such? Such a view would break up with a persistently hermetic nature of the tradition opening up for a dialogue.
More...Keywords: Barbara Sienkiewicz; Young Poland; Polish literature 19c; Polish literature 20c;
Review: Barbara Sienkiewicz, Poznawanie i nazywanie. Refleksja cywilizacyjna i epistemologiczna w Polskiej poezji modernistycznej [‘Recognising and Naming: Reflecting on Civilisation and Epistemology in Polish Modernist Poetry’], Cracow 2007.Barbara Sienkiewicz reconstructs the genealogy of contemporary Polish poetry by associating and identifying links between the remote phenomena of the ‘Young Poland’, futurism, the Cracow avant-garde, works by Różewicz, or neo-lingu(al)ism. The antinomic nature of twentieth-century lyric poetry shows in its cyclically recurring oppositions: rationalism vs. irrationalism; affirmation of the world vs. negativism; social and civilisation-related utopianism vs. catastrophism; cognitive optimism vs. pessimism; autonomy vs. involvement. However, any attempt at arranging these issues into a clear cyclic pattern implies a considerable risk. Modernity does not cease to represent itself as an aporiatic formation, one that is consolidated through oppositions or contradictions.
More...Keywords: Galin Tihanov; Lukács; Bakhtin; Literary theory
Review: Galin Tihanov, Pan i niewolnik. Lukács, Bachtin i idee ich czasów [The Master and The Slave: Lukács, Bakhtin, and the Ideas of Their Time], transl. into Polish by M. Adamiak; ed. by D. Ulicka; Oficyna Naukowa, Warsaw 2010. In his review of Galin Tihanov’s comparative study of Lukács and Bakhtin, Mrugalski argues that the work, while attentive to details, is rather weak in its general concept. Key passages are devoted to Georg Simmel’s influence on both thinkers, on Russian theory of ideology, discussions on the novel, and the notion of dialogism. On the whole, the work represents a bizarre amalgam of positivism and deconstruction – a mix of perspectives that was prevalent in the 1990s. Tihanov disassembles an oeuvre into its constituent influences, which, combined with his quasi-hysterical search for aporias, renders it effectively impossible to appreciate the originality and the signifiance of both thinkers’ concepts. Tihanov’s central allegory of Hegel’s master-slave dialectics is particularly misfortunate, and for a number of reasons: not only does it fit ill with the two thinkers’ mutual relationship, but also it stands in the way of appreciating Bakhtin’s subversion of the model of mastery and bondage. It was in fact this questioning of master-slave dialectics that informed the most groundbreaking theses of Bakhtin’s aesthetics.
More...Keywords: Bożena Shallcross; Rzeczy i Zagłada; Holocaust studies
Review: Bożena Schallcross, Rzeczy i Zagłada [‘Things and the Shoah’], Wydawnictwo Universitas, Kraków 2009.
More...Keywords: Cyprian Norwid; Polish Literature (19 c.); Romanticism; Poetry; Arent van Neiukerken
Review: Arent van Nieukerken, Perspektywiczność sacrum. Szkice o Norwidowskim romantyzmie [‘The prospectivity of sacrum. Sketches on Norwidian romanticism], Warszawa 2007 The review presents an interesting and original strategy of reading Cyprian-Kamil Norwid’s output, elaborated by Arent van Nieukerken. It is associated with the categories of ironical conceptism and, particularly, prospectivity, enabling to interpret this poet’s pieces in the context of modernity and modernism (in its Anglo-Saxon meaning). These categories make possible an interpretation of the Norwidian poetics, anthropology, vision of the world and history. The artist’s oeuvre can thus, in a sense, be singled out of the context of Polish romanticism and read in a comparative manner in the context of modern European literature.
More...Keywords: Literary Theory; Poetics; Dictionary; Methodology
In general, it can be argued that albeit some very significant work has been done, the theory of genres has not been the object of sustained initiative by any major theorist or critical movement. As a result, contemporary critics and theorists of literature find themselves with comparatively little to say about one of the most basic categories of their study. It is in this context that the appearance of an anthology by Grzegorz Gazda and Słowinia Tynecka-Makowiecka is groundbreaking. It assembles more than 600 articles representing theoretical work on genre done by various scholars contributing to a theoretical journal Zagadnienia Rodzajów Literackich, published since 1958 in Lodz. In addition to providing a generally useful publication, the Glossary of Literary Kinds and Genres has framed the outstanding legacy of the Stefania Skwarczyńska’s school and its theoretical work on genre. Although genre theory as presented in the book may be criticised for being conservative, the overall outcome provides an unparalleled publication, having few global-scale competitors in critical theory.
More...Keywords: Cultural studies; Review; Humanities; Methodology
Review: Kulturo-znawstwo. Dyscyplina bez dyscypliny? [‘Studies-in-Culture: A discipline without a discipline?’], ed. by W.J. Burszta, M. Januszkiewicz, Wydawnictwo Szkoły Wyższej Psychologii Społecznej ‘Academica’ [Warsaw School of Social Sciences & Humanities press], Warszawa 2010. The book being reviewed is a monograph by various authors who have attempted at defining the position of cultural studies among other research areas (history, literary science, philosophy, ethnology or anthropology), trying to point out to the most typical cognitive strategies which may shape up the cultural studies’ specificity. The reviewer primarily refers to two threads touched upon in this publication: a profile of the research attitude referred to as ‘cultural-study-oriented’ and the history of Polish research that can be considered to have anticipated our contemporary cultural studies. Cultural studies generally tend to renounce any association with the formula of traditional disciplines characterised by specifically defined subject and research methods; yet, there can be no better word describing its purpose. Beside internal discussions on crises of subsequent traditional disciplines, this might be seen as a manifestation of eventual prevalence of non-systemic and post-disciplinary thinking in the humanities. Viewed from a different angle, they may be considered an attempt of saving the humanities’ unity against modern specialisation trends.
More...Keywords: Michał Mrugalski; Tadeusz Różewicz; Polish Poetry 20c.; History of Art.
Book review: Michał Mrugalski, Teoria barw Tadeusza Różewicza [‘Tadeusz Różewicz’s theory of colour’], Universitas, Kraków 2007. The book by Michał Mrugalski has been intended as a comprehensive analysis of the association between the art of painting and Różewicz’s poetry. It is, however, a hermetic erudite study focusing mostly on the complexities of philosophy and theory of art. The reviewer claims that the approach taken by the author, however interesting for the philosophically-minded readers, does not lead to a better understanding of the intersemiotic relations of literature and visual arts.
More...Review: „French Theory” w Polsce, E. Domańska, M. Loba, eds., Wydawnictwo Poznańskie, Poznań 2010
More...Keywords: Stefania Kossowska; Anna Frajlich; Correspondence; Polish Diaspora in London (20 c.)
Discussion of a recently published collection of letters written by Stefania Kossowska (1909–2003), literary critic, prose writer and columnist who stayed from World War 2 onwards in London as an émigré and was the last editor of Wiadomości weekly, to poet Anna Frajlich (born 1942) who lived since 1970 in New York. The letters’ diversified themes make us aware of Ms. Kossowska’s participation in cultural life of the Polish Diaspora in London, her views on Polish contemporary literature both at home and in exile; this as complemented, after 1989, by a voice in the discussion on mutual coherence (or separateness) of the two literary currents, as well as remarks on issues and events of import to Polish society (incl. the year 1968 emigration wave, anti-Semitic events, outbreak of martial law). A thread of importance is the editor’s personal relationship with the poet over whose artistic development she watched, patronising her literary career. Hence, this indirectly provides an excellent source of knowledge on Anna Frajlich’s life and artistic output. In its footnotes, the publication comprises essential information on activities of several other Polish émigrés in the United Kingdom and the United States, and on the panorama of Polish emigration cultural-literary periodicals and institutions of Polish scientific and artistic life in exile
More...Keywords: Polish Literature (20 c.); Stanisław Brzozowski; Cezary Michalski; Sławomir Sierakowski; Editorship; Contemporary Polish Politics.
Review of: Stanisław Brzozowski, Głosy wśród nocy [‘Voices Amidst the Night’], Wydawnictwo Krytyki Politycznej [Political Critique periodical’s publishing house], Warszawa, 2007, p. 318 The author raises numerous objections regarding the form of publication and editorial elaboration of the book by Brzozowski, first published in 1913. She is also concerned about attempts at instrumentalising the discourse proposed by Brzozowski in politics or journalism, referred to as the ‘fifth authority’ – and this not for the reason that in such a perspective, ethical attitudes get almost instantaneously devaluated. The author deems it interesting and significant of our time that the soul of our great critic is univocally demanded, this time, by the new left and neoconservatives. The proposal to read the Brzozowski legacy anew, presented by Cezary Michalski and Sławomir Sierakowski, the authors of introductions to individual texts, seems to Mr. Orska a rather morally ambiguous attempt at saddling the ‘skeleton of Brzozowski’ in its march through the history of Polish intelligentsia, in order to check how far one can possibly get when mounted on it.
More...Keywords: Andrzej Bobkowski; Review
Buntownik, cyklista, Kosmopolak. O Andrzeju Bobkowskim i jego twórczości, red. J. Klejnocki, A.St. Kowalczyk, Towarzystwo "Więź", Warszawa 2011.
More...Keywords: Postcolonialism; Sovietology; Polish History; Ukrainian History; East-Central Europe.
Review of the book: From Sovietology to Postcoloniality. Poland and Ukraine from a Postcolonial Perspective, ed. Janusz Korek, Stockholm: Södertörn Academic Studies 32, 2007. Although the articles presented in the book differ in theme and the measure of their postcolonial orientation, the volume as a whole is a remarkable undertaking. Alongside Violeta Kelertas’ Baltic Postcolonialism it can be deemed a groundbreaking work in the field of postcolonial studies in East Central European societies.
More...Keywords: Review; "Ślady obecności"; Polish-Jewish literature 20c; Holocaust
Review: Ślady obecności [‘Traces of Presence’], ed. by Sławomir Buryła, Alina Molisak, Universitas, Kraków 2010. The articles comprised in this book concern twentieth-century Polish-Jewish literature, a still not satisfactorily explored area, and the Jewish issues – particularly, the one of identity (Jewishness/Polishness relation) and the Holocaust – undertaken within the said literature as well as in the Polish literary domain.
More...Keywords: Second Republic of Poland; Jews
The article is an attempt at comparing the structure of participation of the representatives of various Jewish communities in local governments of three metropolitan regions of the Second Republic of Poland. The author analyses the status of the Jewish representatives as well as the differences in legal organisation, traditions, perceptions and attitudes of local communities which were the outcome of different past experience under the partition of Poland. She presents the development of the condition of local governments, stressing the importance of persistent regionalisms, discusses the influence of the political situation of the country for the local governments and communities, with particular stress on the increasing interventionism as well as the interdependence between the tendency to unify the regions and to unify the administrative system, and the condition of Jewish representatives in local governments.
More...Keywords: animal studies; posthumanities; non-anthropocentric poetry; non-anthroponormative poetics;
Review: A. Jarzyna Post-koiné: Studia o nieantropocentrycznych językach (poetyckich) [PostKoiné: Studies in Non-Anthropocentric (Poetic) Languages], Wydawnictwo UŁ, Łódź 2019.
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