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EN
The article discusses the problem of urban dystopia in Czesław Miłosz’s works. In his many essays, memoirs as well as poems various cities are shown as the examples of cite ´ infernal, land of Ulro or at least as an oppressive space in which traditional human relationship is disordered. Warsaw always seems to be an “unreal city” destroyed by the history. Miłosz describes the capital of Poland in the shadow of the World War II. The ruins of Warsaw in the 1940’s give the impression of a city that never existed. Modern Paris is portrayed as the capital of the World, but on the other hand, for Miłosz, it is an example of corrupted Western civilization, in which human life is always determined by the money and social status. The American cities are considered by Miłosz as temporary camps, not related neither to history, nor to nature. All these symptoms of urban dystopia are contrasted in Miłosz’s works with the myth of province (identified especially with Lithuania).
EN
The article is a contextual interpretation of Czesław Miłosz’s poem Œconomia Divina. Connoting other Miłosz’s works published at the time of Œconomia Divina publication allows to present its dystopian character. The dystopian character is self-evident in Miłosz’s unfinished novel The Parnas Mountains. Œconomia Divina appears to be a project of dystopia which was more completely realized in this novel.
EN
The study analyzes the transformations undergone by the topic of sadness in individual decades, paying particular attention to the discussion on “the poet’s right to be sad” in poetry reacting to the dogmatically asserted ideology of Socialist Realism in the first half of the 1950s. This discussion was initiated in Slovakia by Milan Rúfus’s poetry collection Až dozrieme (When we Grow Mature). During the 1960s the discussion over the poet’s right to be sad when confronted by civilizational threats gradually transformed into a dystopian alternative. The characteristic feature of melancholic modality during this period came to be irony. Within the Czech cultural context it is represented by Kundera’s novel Žert (The Joke), which is a reaction not only to the pioneering optimism of Socialist Realism, but also to the traditional understanding of humanism. Confronting current ecological threats, the author finds some overlap with the present in the period discussion over “the right to be sad”. In this respect he notes the term “environmental grief ”, which is now being used by the Czech sociologist Hana Librová.
EN
A robot is an important figure in the patterns of dystopian literature and science fiction cinema. Over the years, artificial humans played the roles of victims or enemies rebelling and fighting with homo sapiens. This conflict was related to the genesis of the robot, that was at the beginning an imaginary character serving the role of mechanical slave. Another important theme developed in dystopian science fiction is the usage of robots in the plots inspired by some counterculture theses. Such inspirations are presented in the short stories and novels of Philip K. Dick who successfully re-interpreted the most popular conventions of the genre. The clichés connected with the iconography of artificial humans also became a significant element of the plots in comic books and cartoons where they are often used to deconstruct some significant stereotypes and indicate postmodern crisis of identity.
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The article explores the theme of dystopia in the cinema of Béla Tarr. The interpretations offered here focus on his three works: Damnation (1989), Sátántangó (1994) and Werckmeister Harmonies (2000). The Hungarian director is a neomodernist, who refers to the style of Andriej Tarkowski, but makes cinema subversive towards tradition of transcendental style. Tarr degrades religious symbols to the rank of elements of the ordinary, material reality, which is slowly falling apart. Dystopian character of his movies is strongly connected with the style of this cinema, which is based on minimalism, slowness and contemplation. Dystopian vision of the world in Tarr’s cinema has three fundamental dimensions and the following parts of this essay consists on these three principal contexts in which the topic of dystopia can be analyzed.
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The L Wor(l)d: Czasoprzestrzenie utopii/dystopii

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EN
This article explores the idea and representation of lesbian or non-heteronormative utopia at work in The L Word TV series. Drawing from such theorists as Grosz, Keinhorst, Johnson or Mellor the article attempts to capture selected utopian qualities of the series as well as to present various redefinitions of the utopian as such, for these redefinitions prove to be pregnant with consequences for the applicability of the concept of utopia in lesbian longing and striving for visibility and emancipation. As lesbian utopia has long been the subject of interest to lesbians themselves and an eroticized theme for heterosexist fantasy it comes as no surprise that the topic has returned in an immensely successful TV production, though the utopian quality in it might be described rather as hinted rather than stated explicitly. What this article insists on in particular is Elizabeth Grosz’s proposition to see the utopian as a mode of temporality and uncontrollable generativity as well as her observation that utopia is always a figure of self-undermining, thus always bordering on the dystopian. In this way my analysis is wary of treating the lesbian utopia as unequivocally emancipatory and didactic, yet seeing it nevertheless as very productive and refreshing both in respect to traditional invisibility of lesbianism or its marginality as well as to the cultural taboo that women should not occupy too much space, not to mention all the space. The text also interrogates the dystopian elements of the series, but from a point of view which sets them as not contradictory to its utopianism.
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PL
Literatura postapokaliptyczna stanowi paradoksalne spojrzenie na katastrofę,a jednocześnie daje możliwość odrodzenia.
EN
Transformations of utopia in the Croatian insular prose of the second half of 20th and the first half of the 21st centuries based on examplesThe article is an attempt to show a different means of presenting the newest Croatian literature than through topics such as the problem of the country’s national tradition, patriotism, post-communism, and issues of identity and emigration, which seems to be the most popular tendency among Polish researchers. Placing her research in the regionalistic stream, the author of the article discusses Croatian insular prose through the category of utopia. She sees The lost homeland [Izgubljeni zavičaj] by Slobodan Novak as an example of modern utopia, interprets The Island of Dreams [Otok snova] by Damir Miloš as a postmodern dystopia and perceives A Guide Across the Island [Vodič po otoku] by Senko Karuza as a vision of a new, post-postmodern type of utopia. Przemiany utopii w chorwackiej prozie insularnej drugiej połowy XX i początku XXI wieku na wybranych przykładachArtykuł jest próbą pokazania innego sposobu prezentowania najnowszej literatury chor­wackiej aniżeli poprzez takie tematy jak problematyka narodowej tradycji kraju, patriotyzm, postkomunizm, kwestie tożsamości i emigracji, co wydaje się najbardziej popularną tendencją wśród polskich badaczy. Autor artykułu, wpisując swoje badanie w nurt regionalistyczny, omawia chorwacką prozę insularną poprzez kategorię utopii. Izgubljeni zavičaj Slobodana Novaka widzi jako przykład utopii modernistycznej, Otok snova Damira Miloša interpretuje jako postmodernistyczną dystopię, zaś Vodič po otoku Senka Karuzy postrzega jako wizję nowego rodzaju utopii post-postmodernistycznej.
EN
The research material for the analyzes presented in the article is “The Gardeners” community outlined by Margaret Atwood in MaddAddam trilogy. The literary record illustrates here the specific form of social microstructure operating in the world of modern utopia; it illustrates the complex nature of the structural levels of social reality. The aim of the study is to analyze the distinguished community in the perspective of the ontological assumptions of sociological structuralism – with particular emphasis being given on the dependencies resulting from the adoption of the close and distant categories of perspective. The author also refers to Emile Durkheim’s theory of social ties, emphasizing the importance of mechanical and organic solidarity as special properties organizing the functioning of the community.
EN
The article is an analysis of the function of dystopia in The Silver Dream of Salomea by Juliusz Słowacki. In this drama, dystopia is identified with an evil place which is the important part of space solutions in the world represented in the piece. A new view of Ukrainian steppe representation is possible thanks to this perspective. The analysis is focused not only on space solutions, but also on theatrical metaphors that represent the inside space of the steppe. As a result of the dystopic perspective, the formal solutions which reinforce the mystical concept of the world presented in the drama become quite conspicuous.
EN
The author wonders how it is possible that such a catastrophic future was described in 1881 when the era of progress peaked. For this purpose, he defines Manuscript from the coming century as a dystopian fantasy (analogous to Fredric Jameson’s “desire called utopia”) and analyses the limits of representation as they emerge in a story of the future written by a nineteenth-century author. Firstly, he shows the cultural image of Stefan Buszczyński which presented him as a romantic epigone. Contrary to the stereotypes, he depicts the writer as a researcher who knows the positivism philosophy and the modern statistics. Then, the author demonstrates the limitations of the dystopian form, which contains two irreconcilable concepts of history: voluntarismand determinism. These contradictions are not the only ones. Also the fantasy materialis made of four contradictory ideologies, namely, Thomism, Rousseauism, criticism of positivism and capitalism. Inconclusion, Buszczyński’s thought is shown as a very modern one and the author of Decline of Europe could be presented as the founder of the 20th century concepts, whose roots lie obviously in the middle of the 19th century.
EN
In this article I have shown various aspects of dystopic discourse, which refer not only to the ways of constructing space and depicted world, but also to the identity of the characters. In the initial parts of the text, I have defined the concept of dystopia and I refer it to the experience of modernity, noting its various components (positive and negative, its utopian and dystopian potential) and specificity in Central and Eastern Europe. Then, I have analysed selected novels by Stefan Żeromski and Joseph Conrad for the presence of these elements of dystopic discourse. Within the framework of the presented analysis and interpretation of the Beauty of Life and Under Western Eyes I have put special emphasis on the relationship between the specificity of modern reality in its dystopic variant and the dynamic, decaying identity of the characters.
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EN
The problem of uprooting is clearly present in poems by Jan Polkowski. The author presents a society expropriated from places of their belonging. People have lost the places which support the bonds of community and help to protect and develop both their individual as well as collective identity. These bad places are where the history operates. The poet reinterprets the places in order to expose the evil of ideology.
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Dystopie Philipa Larkina

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EN
This essay sets out to examine the problem of dystopia in the poetry of Philip Larkin. Itmayseematfirstthathispoetryisratherremotelyrelatedtodystopia,especiallyifwe define it as a highly pessimistic narrative, which predicts and depicts the catastrophic state of man kind in the future. However, up on adoption of as lightly more comprehensive definition of dystopia, which defines it as a work of literature describing the subjective feeling of being in a “bad place”, Larkin’s poetry immediately reveals its dystopian dimension. For Larkin, this “bad place” is life itself with its irremediable finitude and inherent imperfection. That is why the bulk of his poetry is profoundly pessimistic. At the same time, Larkin knows that such constant awareness of ultimate pointlessness of life is an impossibility, and people must rely on certain analgesics, whose goal is to make life at least temporarily bearable. Two such pain-relieving strategies analysed in this essay include an effort to forge an intimate relationship with another person, and seeking solace in narratives of religion.
EN
The topic of the paper is Gnostic, and therefore total, experience of the world as a bad place in the context of the postulate (resulting from the postmodern critical attitude) to replace the total programs of the world’s transformation with partial transformations. A novel by Veselin Stoyanov (1957−2014) constitutes the subject matter of the analyses. The interpretative perspective is given by the utopian/ dystopian discourse, especially by the category of ‘dystopia’ as interpreted by M. Keith Booker. The reflection is focused on the consequences of the author’s attempt at reinterpreting and even unmasking a total thought, as well as on the diagnosis of world’s corruption in relation to the social criticism. Therefore, a crucial meaning is given to the question of the writer’s involvement, and finally − to the status of evil in literature. The paper raises the question of the functioning of the dystopia in the conditions of postmodernity.
EN
A novel by Czech writer Jan Weiss, which was edited in Poland under the title Mullerdom Has One Thousand Floors, is analysed in the present article. It presents a history of reception of the book that provoked a lot of controversial opinions in the past, but which is being rediscovered today. The author of the article suggests a new interpretation of the novel, inspired by present interest in dystopia and by some texts, fundamental for the European culture (Mass revolution by Ortega y Gasset among others), which have warned public opinion against serious threats posed by modern culture. A dystopian significance of Weiss’s novel is compared to visions created by famous anti-utopian book soft hat time, which could have influenced the Czech writer: Zamiatin (We) and Wells (Time Machine). The article stresses the dissimilarity between the threats shown by Weiss and those described by Zamiatin and Wells. According to Weiss the main dangers are: the principle of pleasure and consumption which rules social behaviour, economic domination suppressing moral values, metaphysical depletion and the state of immaturity of the society as well as culture. All of them left the Europeans defenceless against the manipulation by a totalitarian power and hopelessly vulnerable to suppression by a totalitarian system. The article also considers the problem of the novel’s end, which was discussed many times by different critics. The author demonstrates that what has seemed to be an optimistic coda of the story, since the plot turns out to be only a nightmare of an ill protagonist, a creation of a feverish imagination, in fact has nothing to do with optimism. Consciously or not, Weiss added a very sarcastic ending to his novel and made a new commentary to the state of culture and society which should be rather alarming than comforting.
EN
Dystopia seems to be one of the most popular motifs in the latest pop culture. One of the reasons for it is that political, economic, and social transformations have happened in many countries. Looming crises in many countries prove the populist politicians take over to start a revolution to change people’s lives and make their nations powerful again. Their point of view seems to be very radical and dangerous. Rapid change from multicultural society into patriarchal society shows that many people are marginalised. Atwood’s and Karpowicz’s novels show countries after transformation where violence and terror is a major rule to control citizens’ lives. Regime breaks the significant laws, and as a result of it, many minorities are discriminated. Their existence is worthless for many reasons. What is more, rebellious citizens are eliminated from society. Both novels reveal dangers that once imposed upon the society by the ultranationalist governments may lead to yet another war.
PL
Dystopia wydaje się jednym z najpopularniejszych motywów w najnowszej kulturze popularnej. Jeden z powodów, dla których jest tak znany, wiąże się z przemianami politycznymi, gospodarczymi i społecznymi, jakie mają miejsce w wielu krajach. Liczne kryzysy potwierdzają fakt, iż populistyczni politycy przejmują władzę, aby rozpocząć rewolucję, która ma zmienić życie ludzi oraz sprawić, że ich narody ponownie staną się potężne. Ich punkt widzenia wydaje się bardzo radykalny i niebezpieczny. Szybka transformacja ze społeczeństwa wielokulturowego w patriarchalne pokazuje, iż wiele osób jest marginalizowanych. Powieści Atwood i Karpowicza pokazują kraje po transformacji, w których przemoc i terroryzm są główną regułą kontrolującą życie obywateli. Reżim łamie podstawowe prawa, w rezultacie czego wiele mniejszości jest dyskryminowanych. Ich istnienie jest bezwartościowe z wielu powodów. Co więcej, zbuntowani obywatele są eliminowani ze społeczeństwa. Obie powieści są mocnym ostrzeżeniem przed niebezpieczeństwami ultranacjonalistycznego rządu, który może doprowadzić do kolejnej wojny światowej.
EN
Two types of utopia can be distinguished: negative and positive. Firstly, ‘dystopia’ is considered as a chaotic place in both ethical thinking and moral reality. “Morality is in the eyes of the beholder really”, says the young student today and expresses a form of ethical relativism that dates back to ancient Greek philosophy. Common visions in our time and even scientific conceptions support this theory with a number of arguments, i.e. historicism, fact–value dichotomy, some consequences of cultural anthropology, sceptical view of human life, ethical non–cognitivism, majority and trends, moral privacy, moral virtues. Each of these arguments is described and evaluated. Secondly, ‘utopia’ is characterized as an ideal community with a perfect socio–moral system. To establish utopia in ethics, a fresh look is taken at some meta–scientific assumptions. They help to list necessary anthropological clarifications including comments about human dignity. Moral values are then to be understood as a part of reality (not fiction) that can be described and rationally discussed. From such a conception, ethical consequences follow for both the political/educational thinking and the practicing of morality in modern societies.
PL
Można wyróżnić dwa rodzaje utopii: negatywną i pozytywną. Pierwsza jest nazywana „dystopią” jako bezład zarówno w ramach myślenia etycznego jak i rzeczywistości moralnej. „Moralne jest naprawdę to, co ktoś uważa za moralne” mówi dzisiaj młody student i wyraża w ten sposób etyczny relatywizm, znany już w starożytnej filozofii greckiej. Współczesne potoczne spojrzenia a nawet koncepcje naukowe wspierają tę teorię wieloma argumentami, takimi jak: historyzm, dychotomia fakt – wartość, wnioski płynące z antropologii kulturowej, sceptyczna wizja ludzkiego życia, niemożność obiektywnego poznania etycznego, opinia większości i trendy, moralna prywatność, cnoty moralne. W artykule zostały opisane i ocenione wszystkie wymienione argumenty. Druga jest nazywana „utopią”, jako idealna wspólnota, z doskonałym systemem społęczno–moralnym. Aby ustalić, czym jest utopia w etyce, proponuje się nowe spojrzenie na niektóre założenia metanaukowe. To pozwala wymienić konieczne antropologiczne wyjaśnienia, łącznie z komentarzem dotyczącym ludzkiej godności. Wartości moralne powinny być wówczas rozumiane jako część rzeczywistości (nie fikcji), która może być opisywana i racjonalnie dyskutowana. Z tej koncepcji wynikają konsekwencje etyczne zarówno dla myślenia politycznego i edukacyjnego, jak i dla praktykowania moralności we współczesnych społeczeństwach.
EN
All nineteen episodes of Black Mirror produced so far deal with the theme of social consequences of technological development. Dystopian vision of the future not only relates to the stories told in each episode, but also the way the series is distributed. Popularity of the series made the creators decide to move the production from traditional television to the Netflix platform. Ironically, the streaming giant is, within the framework of entertainment industry, a fulfilment of some disturbing features of new technologies, shown in the diegetic layer of Black Mirror.
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