SĄDY FILOLOGÓW O ANDRZEJU GAWROŃSKIM ŚWIADECTWEM GENIUSZU MULTILINGWISTY

• Authors: Chrostek Mariusz

Title variants

EN

Philologists’ opinions on Andrzej Gawroński as evidence of the multilinguist’s genius

• Languages of publication: PL

Abstracts

EN

Andrzej Gawroński, professor of the Jagiellonian University and the Lviv University, was one of the most outstanding linguistic experts on Indology and Oriental studies in Europe. With his brilliant photographic memory and unusual capacity for learning foreign languages, he mastered about 140 of them, becoming one of the greatest multilinguists worldwide. Thanks to those skills and his passion for learning, Gawroński made a lot of impressive discoveries in Old Indian literature, showed a series of connections between European literature and culture (ancient Greek or Hungarian) and the cultural heritage of Asian countries (Indian, Persian). As a language theoretician he became the major Polish representative of the so-called psychologism. He also accomplished a lot in the field of Polish studies. Literary gifted, he could write clearly and logically about most difficult things, and he wrote interestingly and with passion. His translations – particularly of Aśvaghoṣa, Omar Khayyám, Sándor Petöfi – have been deemed congenial on account of their philological precision and the unusually faithful rendering of the spirit of the original. Gawroński’s short and tragic life which lasted only 41 years, was shared between intensive work and a desperate struggle with TB. The modest Lviv genius did not use to sign his works and the majority of his work was left in manuscripts, most of which were lost. Nowadays he is a largely unknown figure, that is why this discussion of the major opinions on Gawroński, where his contemporary eminent philologists express ultimate admiration for his research work, is an attempt to remember that extraordinary man.

Keywords

EN

Andrzej Gawroński; indologist; Orientalist; polyglot; reception; biography

• Publisher: Towarzystwo Przyjaciół Nauk w Przemyślu
• Journal: Rocznik Przemyski
• Year: 2016
• Volume: 52
• Issue: 2(20): Literatura i Język
• Pages: 39-51

Contributors

author

Chrostek Mariusz