Volume 9, Issue 1

In cerca del doppio: cinque personaggi alfieriani tra scissione e proiezione

Fabio Boni

Romanica Cracoviensia, Volume 9, Issue 1, Volume 9 (2009), pp. 11-19

This article analyses five of Alfieri’s heroes (Orestes, Don Garzia, Rosmunda, Saul and Mirra) and tries to discover if their actions and behaviour can be linked to the theme of the double, despite the fact that Alfieri had no intention of analysing this literary archetype, as is known from his silence on the subject.
Their personality is characterized by division and projection, which is also to be found in tales of the double; the article tries to demonstrate that these diseases are caused by the double.
The article considers the theme of the double or doppelganger, both in literature and in psychoanalysis, with special attention to Otto Rank, who was one of the leading experts on the subject.

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Natalia Chwaja

Romanica Cracoviensia, Volume 9, Issue 1, Volume 9 (2009), pp. 20-33

The aim of this article is to explain the meaning and analyse the role of the journey along the Danube river in the novel Danube by Claudio Magris. The analisys presents two separate interpretations of the literary odyssey. The first one emphasizes the importance of the journey understood as georgaphical, philosophical and sociological research of the novel’s protagonist (the author’s alter-ego: a scholar, a germanist and a traveller in one). The second one highlights it’s meaning for the development of the protagonist’s identity, illustrating the ways in which the unique “hapsburg” manner of travelling affects his life and his personality. In order to underline the existential dimension of the journey, the article presents and analyses the scenes where the main character in shown as a disciple, who follows his spiritual guides to learn about himself and about the human nature.

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Le desengaño picaresque

Sonia Fajkis

Romanica Cracoviensia, Volume 9, Issue 1, Volume 9 (2009), pp. 34-42

This article explores the motif of desengaño – disillusion – in picaresque novel. Desengaño, usually associated with the works of Spanish poets of baroque period such as Quevedo, Gracian, appears to be one of the important stages in future picaro’s life. Based on works that codified the genre (anonymous Lazarillo de Tormes and Guzman de Alfarache by Mateo Aleman) and also on those that prolonged the tradition in Europe (Moll Flanders by Daniel Defoe and Les Mémoires de la vie de Henriette-Sylvie de Molière by Madame de Villedieu) the article traces out the presence and peculiarity of this motif in picaresque novel.

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Małgorzata Kuta

Romanica Cracoviensia, Volume 9, Issue 1, Volume 9 (2009), pp. 43-54

The article talks about a selection of lyrical quotes Rrose Sélavy which appeared in 1922. It is the result of language experiments Robert Desnos carried out at the beginning of his adventure with surrealism. The entertaining aphorisms are closely connected to the practice of hypnotic séances, as they were created in half-conscious, medium-like clairvoyance. Their completely new meaning – poetical, humorous and often paradoxical – was achieved by making skilful use of the incredible homonymity of the French language, exquisite employment of the sound similarity within words and putting to practice numerous rhetorical devices. We have alliterations, anagrams, homonyms, paronyms and, first of all, the play of monosyllables (contrepèteries) where letters and syllables are switched between two or more words. The texts, surreal par excellence , make readers wonder – are they a pure language structure without a deeper sense and hidden message or do they actually expose “the real functioning of thoughts” as André Breton put it in the Surrealist manifesto in 1924.

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Karolina Leśniewska

Romanica Cracoviensia, Volume 9, Issue 1, Volume 9 (2009), pp. 55-62

The article intends to show how only the treatment of time and space in the XVth century novel Saladin influences the mythologization of the hero. The world of Saladin doesn’t seem to have any limits and it revels in the sultan’s extraordinary strength, that only Europe can stop. The geographical situation of this continent evokes the presence of the sea, which constitutes one of the most interesting elements of the novel, although there is no precise description of this element. It gives rise to associations related to the isolation of the hero; the sea will also be chosen as the place of his death. While the space aspect of the novel is very richly illustrated, the time aspect is treated in a quite curt manner. The only exception is the presentation of the time of the sultan’s death, which permits us to take up some questions related with his faith.

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Dorota Pudo

Romanica Cracoviensia, Volume 9, Issue 1, Volume 9 (2009), pp. 63-80

The author analyses the picture of family relationships in the 13th-century epics belonging to the cycle of William of Orange (Narbonnais), comparing it to the one presented in corresponding fragments of the 15th-century prose adaptation of this cycle, and alluding to the real, historical functioning of medieval families. At the level of mutual communication between the members of Narbonne family, some attenuation of the expression of anger can be noticed, by means of eliminating the invectives and other irrespectful forms. The same tendency appears in presenting other types of Narbonne family’s behaviour: in the adaptation, they are deprived of the epic vehemence and brutality (Aymeri doesn’t hit his wife, and his son doesn’t threaten him with his sword). In both versions, the family is strongly paternalistic, and the count dominates his wife as well as his sons. Nevertheless, whereas the epic song is concerned mainly by the differences between the maternal and paternal vision of their sons’ education, the adaptation focuses on the generation conflict. Finally, one can notice a change in the place of the family in the system of values: in the song, the social values are more important (position, wellness, welfare of the lineage as a whole), whereas the prose author seems to value more the relationships between family members defined as unique, irreplaceable creatures.

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Alicja Raczyńska

Romanica Cracoviensia, Volume 9, Issue 1, Volume 9 (2009), pp. 81-91

The paper aims at analyzing the motif of metamorphosis in the epigraphic elegy Tumulus Ielseminae puellae in florem versae from the volume De tumulis by Giovanni Pontano. The author indicates the classic sources of inspiration: the myths from the Metamorphoses by Ovid and compares the motif of metamorphosis from the epigraphic elegy of Pontano with the transformation of human beings into plants described in the canto XIII of Dante’s Inferno and in Petrarch’s Canzoniere. Further, the paper analyses the motif of metamorphosis and the representation of Death in other epigraphic elegies from De tumulis as well as the significance of the Nature in Pontano’s works and in the fifteenth-century writings in Latin by Italian poets.

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Le romancier, l’écrivain et Dieu

Dominique Rougé

Romanica Cracoviensia, Volume 9, Issue 1, Volume 9 (2009), pp. 92-100

In his famous paper from 1939, entitled “M. François Mauriac et la liberté” [Eng. transl. “François Mauriac and freedom”], Jean-Paul Sartre argues polemically with F. Mauriac about his novel La fin de la nuit [Eng. transl. The End of the Night]. He accuses him of not allowing any latitude to his characters, of considering himself as their owner, of beeing God who knows everything about his creatures and disposes them his own fussy way. F. Mauriac has anticipated this criticism previously in 1933, in his text entitled “Le romancier et ses personnages” [‘The Novelist and his Characters’], in which he wards off considering himself a God and writes, that novelists are only the Almighty’s monkies. Mauriac says, that in his novels he combines elements cominf from reality and fruits of his imagination.
Next Milan Kundera, particularly in his novel L’art du roman [Eng. transl. The Art of the Novel] criticizes sharply novelist, who, just like Sartre or Mauriac, make use of their characters to hand down their ideas. He says, that they should be demoted to writers. According to him, no one is the owner of novel’s characters, even their author. However, paradoxically, Kundera dedicates a lot of time to explain to his readers this what he wrote and to his feeling of betrayal and of incomprehension from his critics and translators.
In reading of those three novelists, it seems that all of them more or less conciously aspire to the role of master of the way of thinking about the literary art.

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Monika Świda

Romanica Cracoviensia, Volume 9, Issue 1, Volume 9 (2009), pp. 101-109

The present article analyses the transformations of the metaphor of journey in the works of Álvaro de Campos in the context of the chronology of his works. In the futurist period, the journey is presented as one of the manners of satisfying the desire of feeling everything in every way and at the same time, according to the main principle of sensacionismo. In the later poems this attitude is substituted by the journey as a metaphor of life, that results in the figure of existential anti-journey, a journey without reason and direction, that communicates the idea of the dispersion of the subject. In the following phase, the point of reference is not anymore the journey, but the preparations for it, which can be considered the figure of the vital activity. In this stage, the journey is the synonym of the moment of decision, so the impossibility of its realisation expresses the suspension of the vital functions and the incapacity of the subject to perform any action in the real world. The transformations of the metaphor of the journey correspond and illustrate the main guidelines of the poetry of Álvaro de Campos.

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Natalia Czopek

Romanica Cracoviensia, Volume 9, Issue 1, Volume 9 (2009), pp. 113-125

The principal purpose of the essay is to propose a model of analysis of the modal alternation and the role of the indicative and subjunctive forms in the expression of probability, doubt, certainty and knowledge in the Spanish and Portuguese languages. The analysis is made separately for the two languages following analogical schemes. The examples are divided according to the structure of the inseparable groups of a modal significance (adverb + verb; verb + verb, etc.). The article includes semantic, syntactic and pragmatic criteria of analysis by emphasizing the role of the mental attitude of the speaker and the modal coherence.

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Iwona Piechnik

Romanica Cracoviensia, Volume 9, Issue 1, Volume 9 (2009), pp. 126-152

The article presents the influence of French on compound words in Breton language. One can observe that this influence is the strongest in the common compound words, particularly in these which relate to everyday and public life – it stems for the long domination of French and voluntary abandonment of the Breton language in favour of French by Bretons. However, thanks to present efforts to protect and restore this language, one can observe a formation of own Breton words for new phenomena and scientific discoveries, which in French and other languages are described with the use of Latin and Greek compound words.
By comparing foreign influences in word formation of the Polish language, we can notice analogous situations in the case of the common composition (i.e. strong influences in everyday vocabulary, when the language is dominated by other languages). However, when it comes to Latin- Greek compositions, Polish readily uses and adopts such words, which have already become internationalisms, because, as a currently strong language, it is not afraid of losing its own identity.

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Eszter Valyon

Romanica Cracoviensia, Volume 9, Issue 1, Volume 9 (2009), pp. 153-168

The present paper discusses the rhetorical / pragmatic dimensions and levels of the verbal irony through the example of La Fontaine’s Rat-fables. Verbal irony performs a pragmatic function, making use of a potential contrast between expected and experienced events. This makes verbal irony generally funnier, more criticizing, more expressive of a difference between expected and ensuing events and more protective of the speaker than literal remarks. This paper also proposes a study of verbal irony, as purely pragmatic phenomenon, in order to provide a plausible review how irony is distinguished from non-irony, how the traditional pragmatic theory, the echoic interpretation theory, the pretence theory and the recent implicit display theory could be applied for checking and analysing the nature and function of the verbal irony in the fables. Furthermore, this set of adequate theories indicates the validity of 17th century fables, and contributes a detailed analysis of the allegoric ‘ironicalness’.

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Anna Ledwina

Romanica Cracoviensia, Volume 9, Issue 1, Volume 9 (2009), pp. 171-179

The aim of this paper is to show, that Andrzej Seweryn, Polish artist, presents the French literature as a guiding light, by treating it like an art and a tool to promote a liberal conception of the world, as well as by undertaking a mission to educate a general public, to sensitize and to respect others. The oeuvre of this outstanding actor is a perfect means of communication, a fundamental way to recognize the human diversity, and it becomes a part of the contemporary multicultural space. The ability to analyse and to reflect as well as being opening to the world render Seweryn a fascinating artist, a brilliant ambassador for contemporary stage, who wishes to make his contribution to the construction of the culture Europe.

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Iwona Piechnik

Romanica Cracoviensia, Volume 9, Issue 1, Volume 9 (2009), pp. 180-189

The article presents contemporary tendencies in French and Polish to reduce the volume of words by the use of abbreviations (apocope and apheresis) and acronyms (initialisms, words from initial sounds, blends). At present, these tendencies are intensified by the increased speed of communication (facilitated by new technologies) as well as by the influence of English, which tends to abbreviate its vocabulary. By comparing French and Polish yet one can observe that French abbreviates words more often (it showed such tendencies earlier too), while Polish uses rather acronyms and contractions instead.

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Volume 9 (2009)