Stefan Zabierowski

The aim of the article is to present the relation of the English writer of Polish origin Joseph Conrad-Korzeniowski to Warsaw. Poland’s capital played a special role in Conrad’s childhood. The boy accompanied his parents, who organized conspiracy, before the outbreak of the 1863 Rising, and he had to witness his father’s imprisonment and trial, and later, together with his parents, go into exile to Vologda. That stay in Warsaw was a traumatic experience for the boy and later it was reflected in Conrad’s writing. The paper also describes two other stays in Warsaw (in 1890 and 1893), when Conrad was already a citizen of Britain, Navy captain and beginning writer. The whole is concluded by presenting Warsaw as the main centre of editing and researching Conrad’s writing.

This article discusses Joseph Conrad’s links with Cracow, the historic capital of Poland and a major centre of Polish culture. Conrad fi rst came to Cracow in February 1869, accompanied by his father Apollo Korzeniowski, who — after several years of exile in northern Russia — had become gravely ill. Conrad visited the city a second time in the summer of 1914, having accepted an invitation from the young Polish politician Józef Hieronim Retinger, and (not without some diffi culty) eventually managed to get himself and his family safely back to Britain after the outbreak of World War I. Both of these sojourns in Cracow played an important role in Conrad’s life — and, one might say, in his creative work as a writer. One of the most vivid memories of his fi rst stay in Cracow was the hero’s funeral given to his father, who had been a victim of tsarist oppression. It was from Cracow that the young Conrad set out for France in order to take up a maritime career in Marseilles. During his second stay in Cracow (and Zakopane) Conrad made the acquaintance of many members of the Polish intellectual elite and took the decision to become actively involved in the cause of Polish independence.

The goal of the article is to show how activities of the communist censorship tried to block, and when this proved impossible, to diminish the social resonance of one of the most important historical works of documentary character – the book 1859 dni Warszawy by Władysław Bartoszewski (Kraków 1974, “Znak” publishing house). When this chronicle had been released, a number of positive reviews was restricted and some of them were not admitted to print. There were attacks on this book in communist party and military periodicals, however it found defenders among scholarly and moral authorities and was valued by the Polish emigration press.

The goal of this article is to present the critical reception of the biography and works of Joseph Conrad in Poland in 1897–1945. Special emphasis is put on the political, social, cultural and aesthetic factors conditioning this process. The reception originated in the era of partitions, whereas Conrad’s relative popularity among the intellectual and artistic elite started only in the interwar period. A special role in promotion of Conrad was played by Stefan Żeromski and the poets associated with the “Skamander” group. In later years, Conrad became the object of fascination of many representatives of the generation of 1910, who were highly infl uenced by Józef Ujejski, author of the monograph O Konradzie Korzeniowskim [On Konrad Korzeniowski]. Conrad’s works played a special role during World War II – they provided moral support to many people struggling against the Nazi and Stalinist

The article attempts at a presentation and an interpretation of a relatively unknown text by Joseph Conrad, namely, his Memoriał w sprawie polskiej [Note on the Polish Problem], written in Zakopane in 1914. The author of this article by interpreting the text of that document proves that it was created – to a great extent − under the influence of trialist conceptions of Galician conservatives, predominantly, an eminent lawyer from Kraków, Ph.D. Teodor Kosch.

The aim of this paper is to present the Polish critical reception of Conrad’s biography and work in the years 1897-2014, with particular emphasis being laid on the political, social, cultural and aesthetic factors that have conditioned this process. The reception began when Poland was still partitioned between Prussia, Russia and Austria. During this ‘Young Poland’ period, Conrad’s work was admired by a small artistic and intellectual elite which included Maria Komornicka, Stanisław Brzozowski and Wincenty Lutosławski. Things changed considerably when Poland regained her independence after World War I. Translations of Conrad’s collected works were published (with the active encouragement of the novelist Stefan Żeromski). The “Skamander” group of poets and the intellectuals grouped around the “Wiadomości Literackie” magazine became fascinated by Conrad, whose work was appreciated by the entire Polish political spectrum, with the sole exception of the communists.
Towards the end of the interwar period, Conrad was seen as a kind of intellectual and moral ideal by leading critics of the younger generation. It was then that Conrad’s image in Poland was codified by Józef Ujejski’s monumental study entitled O Konradzie Korzeniowskim (On Conrad Korzeniowski – 1937).
During the Second World War, Conrad became a moral landmark for those Poles – especially members of the Home Army – who were actively engaged in the struggle against Nazi Germany and Soviet Russia.
After the war, Conrad was strongly attacked by Marxists (and by Jan Kott in particular). During the period of relative liberalization which followed the political ‘thaw’ of 1956, Conrad’s books were widely read in independent intellectual circles and also began to be the subject of scholarly research. The period of the 1970s was particularly favourable for Conrad in Poland, as it was then that Zdzisław Najder played a leading role in the process of publishing, interpreting and popularizing his works.
The restoration of democracy in 1989 removed all the remaining political obstacles to the popularization and study of Conrad’s work in Poland and a new generation of young and able scholars began to offer new approaches to the interpretation of his work. Unfortunately, however, in recent years Poland has not seen any significant growth in interest in Conrad on the part of the general reading public. We may note that in the past this interest would seem to have been occasioned in large measure by discussions on key issues of Polish culture, as Conrad – on account of his Polish heritage and his own considerable influence on Polish culture – was always considered to have been “one of us”.
 

The goal of this article is to depict an important episode in a biography of an outstanding Polish poet, a representative of “the generation of Columbuses” – Krzysztof Kamil Baczyński. This episode was the military service of the poet. Baczyński consciously resigned from the Polish studies at the secret Warsaw University and in June of 1943 joined the Assault Groups of the Gray Ranks. He went through all the training stages on the cadet level and took part in assault actions, including detonation of a train transporting German soldiers. On 1st August 1944 he took part in the Warsaw Upraising and on the 4th day of said month he died in the Blank Palace at the Theater Square. The motives of Baczyński’s actions were the family tradition as well as the model of the soldier-poet preserved in the Romantic culture.