HOW DID I BECOME A WRITER? ETHICAL ASPECTS OF POLISH LITERARY AUTOBIOGRAPHIES OF 19TH AND 20TH CENTURY (Jak zostalem pisarzem? Aspekty etyczne polskich autobiografii literackich XIX i XX wieku)

• Authors: Paczoska Ewa
• Languages of publication: PL

Abstracts

EN

The article shows the ethical aspects of three major Polish literary autobiographies, representing different generations of writers. They are: 'Autobiography in the letters' of Eliza Orzeszkowa, 'My contemporaries' of Stanislaw Przybyszewski and 'Polish memories; of Witold Gombrowicz. All authors create the image of the writer as the conscience of culture, therefore, emphasize their own sense of duty, responsibility, and patriotism. It reveals the persistence shaped in the nineteenth-century story about a Polish writer who must subordinate his work and his imagination to ethics of obligation. We can find this pattern not only in case of Orzeszkowa (the supporter of the philosophy of positivism) but also in case of Przybyszewski (modernist provocateur) and Gombrowicz who wants to change and revalue the 'form' of Polish culture after the Second World War. With this pattern, all authors fight with their competitors in the field of literature, which obliges us to ask again for their ethical choices. For a symbolic rejection of forms in Polish literary autobiography, a novel by Andrzej Stasiuk 'How Did I Become a Writer', written shortly after the 1989, can be considered.

Keywords

EN

GOMBROWICZ WITOLD; ORZESZKOWA ELIZA; PRZYBYSZEWSKI STANISLAW; WRITER'S IMAGE

Discipline

• PHILOLOGY_&_LINGUISTICS: PHILOLOGY & LINGUISTICS

• Publisher: Warsaw University, Institute of Philosophy, Institute of Polish Literature and Academy of Fine Arts in Warsaw
• Journal: Przegląd Filozoficzno-Literacki
• Year: 2009
• Volume: 6
• Issue: 2(23)
• Pages: 137-158
• Document type: ARTICLE

Contributors

author

Paczoska Ewa

• Ewa Paczoska, Uniwersytet Warszawski Wydzial Polonistyki, Zaklad Literatury Pozytywizmu i Mlodej Polski, ul. Krakowskie Przedmiescie 26/28, 00-927 Warszawa, Poland

Identifiers

CEJSH db identifier

09PLAAAA068023