Krzysztof Zajas

Pretekstem dla artykułu jest wydana w 2000 roku wspólnie przez Jurija Andruchowycza i Andrzeja Stasiuka książka pt. Moja Europa, z podtytułem: Dwa eseje o Europie zwanej Środkową, przy czym esej Andruchowycza nazywa się Środkowowschodnie rewizje, natomiast Stasiuka – Dziennik okrętowy. Ten projekt literacki jest wręcz ostentacyjnie pograniczny i znakomicie wpisuje się w literackie i ogólnohumanistyczne mody ostatnich lat. Dwaj pisarze, polski i ukraiński, zaprzyjaźnieni od dawna, postanawiają przedstawić swoje punkty widzenia na Europę – własną, prywatną, inną od tej oficjalnej, narysowaną od nowa na mapach osobistych kulturowych fascynacji. Podtytuł komentuje tytuł, dopisuje do niego zawężenie i zarazem zaprzeczenie, zgłasza obecność przedmiotu zwanego Europą Środkową, biorąc go od razu w cudzysłów, gdyż jego istnienie sprowadza się do używania nazwy. Sięgając po tę książkę, lądujemy w samym środku problemów związanych z definicją tej dziwnej krainy, której im więcej poświęcamy uwagi, tym bardziej staje się ulotna i mglista. Środkowa Europa istnieje tylko dlatego, że o niej wciąż piszemy.

THE CZESŁAW MIŁOSZ’S BOTANICAL EPIPHANIES
Epiphany belongs to the most common themes of literary criticism concerning Czesław Miłosz’s poetic work. The interpreters accentuate that: 1. the importace of the epiphanical experience lies in the momentary character of it (Marian Stala); 2. the poetry brings us in the epiphany to the religious sublimation (Jan Błoński); 3. the epiphany is a trope of reality, a mark of presence (Ryszard Nycz). In the opinion of Miłosz, epiphany is the way to find God between the things around us. The connection of epiphany and botanic is based on the memories of the poet, who many times has spoken about his fascination for the plants world. Memory – ilumination – epiphany is the typical triad for Miłosz’s poetry. The poetic imagination in epiphanic poems is founded upon clear visualization of details, which offers Miłosz not only a sentimental comeback, but also the sense of the artistic fulfi lment

Borderlands outlined

The borderlands, peripheries, little motherlands – it is on such concepts that the discourse on multiculturalism – one of the most powerful discourses in Polish literature of the last two decades, is being built. Its inner dynamic shows the tension between opening oneself up to the Other One, and the impossibility of crossing the borderline that separates us from him. As a result of it, multiculturalism becomes transformed into yet another community myth of the Poles – this time, a myth serving to become adjusted to the European cultural standards. A positive intention, visible in sympathetic narrations about the Other One, is confronted with helplessness caused by one’s own limitations. The cultural project becomes confronted with Reality. Our multiculturalism remains a Polish perspective which attempts but vainly to rid itself of its own limitations. Yet in the Polish literature of recent years, one can fi nd authors who go one step further (Stasiuk, Tkaczyszyn-Dycki) and who try to listen to the voice of the genuine Other One, who is to be found outside the borders of the all-appropriating myth of Polish multiculturalism.

Troubles with the Polishness. Boy and Mickiewicz

Tadeusz Boy Żeleński read Mickiewicz as if it were a complex depiction of Polish national soul’s meanders. Love for the motherland, patriotism and prophet’s mythology on the one hand, and concealment of facts, destroying historical documents and ordinary lies on the other. Boy’s criticism, developed on the basis of French rationalism, cuts this mishmash open, like a scalpel revealing areas affected with illness that need to be cured by enlightened reason. It would appear that these nearly a century old, perverse, and thus revelatory conclusions have become almost obsolete. Nothing could be further from the truth. In Poland they will never cease to be valid...      

 

Catching the Elusive. The Benefits of Borderlands Studies

Borderlands, like the nation, have their space and time, their history, politics, culture and literature – and their contradictory aims. When we wish to say something sensible about borderland literature, sooner or later we must turn to the problem of identity that has been destabilized, lost, or which is stubbornly protected. Borderlands are places of the interaction of cultures, which is not necessarily conflictual, but which is always inscribed into the relationship between the self and the other. The borderlands situation contains a fundamental contradiction: it demands clear identification from the subject, while at the same time making such identification impossible because of the very conditions of multiculturalism. As a result, a text that belongs to borderland literature speaks by means of a series of discourses which comprise a composition (mosaic of discourses), while also registering the conventional and artificial nature of these discourses. Therefore, we can project a borderland history of literature, but it requires different approaches to the text and its new, especially borderland interpretation.