Polish Literature in the European Context

Timetable

Module aim (aims)

• acquainting students with important and/or representative phenomena of broadly understood Polish
  literature, its prominent representatives and its reception within a comparative approach (the main ideas,
  currents, trends and genres of the global literature) and building skills of finding wide-ranging references to
  their cultural and historical background (global and Polish histories)
• developing the skills of analysis, interpretation and evaluation of a literary work within a basic theoretical and
  historical frame of knowledge with a particular stress on Polish literature’s uniqueness and its selected
  representatives in the light of various forms of intercultural contact (the flux of ideas and currents, the
  translations to foreign languages, the reception of masterpieces of the world literature)
• developing of skills in using historical and aesthetic categories and in putting in use an organized knowledge, skills and competences from other modules of humanities studies
• to make students acquainted with important and/or representative phenomena of broadly understood
  interpretations of literary works by prominent Polish authors; the interpretations shall be placed in the
  comparative perspective (world literature key ideas, movements, trends and genres)
• to equip students with skills enabling them to refer major Polish literary works to their cultural and historical
  (global and Polish history) context
• to develop in students an ability to analyse, interpret and evaluate a literary work using basic knowledge
  from the fields of literary theory and history of literature; a special emphasis shall be laid on peculiarity of
  Polish literary works in the light of various forms of contacts (transmission of ideas and movements,
  translations to foreign languages, reception of key figures of world literature)
• to develop in students an ability to use concepts taken from history of literature and aesthetics as well as to
  apply well-ordered knowledge, skills and competences from other arts modules

Pre-requisites in terms of knowledge, skills and social competences (where relevant)

English skills at the B1 level.

Syllabus

Course content:

• Transitions in ideas, currents, trends and genres (eg. humanism, manierism, historicism, messianic, epic, irony, modernism, postmodernism…).
• Polish literature in the context of European literatures (the writer’s place in socjety, reception strategies,
  literary market).
• Global literature in relations to the world’s history (literary works in relations to important historical
  events: the dusk of antiquity, Renaissance, the French Revolution and the industrial one, Napoleonic wars, the colonization and the decolonization, totalitarian regimes and the Holocaust, globalization processes…).
• The masterpieces of the world’s literaturę with their Polish translations and reception (eg. Oddysey, Hamlet, Faust, Madame Bovary, Anna Karenina, The Magic Mountain).
• Polish writers and their reception of foreign influences (np. Górnicki vs Castiglione; Kochanowski vs Horace; Morsztyn vs Marino; Krasicki vs Rousseau; Mickiewicz vs Goethe; Norwid vs Baudelaire; Komornicka vs Woolf; Berent vs Nietsche; Iwaszkiewicz vs Mann).
• Periods in Polish, European and world literature.
• Periods in Polish literature in the context of literature development general trends – shared and individual
  features.
• Relations between Polish literature and other national literatures.
• Key Polish authors and their works.
• Masterpieces of Polish and world literature.
• Nobel Price – authors, reception, prestige and discussions.
• Main aesthetic trends (movements, groups, concepts).

Reading list

1. A Companion to Comparative Literature, ed. by A. Behdad and D. Thomas, Wiley Blackwell 2014 (articles by David Ferris, David Palumbo-Liu).
2. A Companion to Comparative Literature, ed. by A. Behdad and D. Thomas, Wiley Blackwell 2014 (articles by Mary Louise Pratt, Allison Van Deventer / Dominica Thomasa).
3. J. Axer, Central-Eastern Europe, w: A Companion to the Classical tradition, ed. by C.W. Kallendorf, Wiley Blackwell 2010.
4. Being Poland: A New History of Polish Literature and Culture since 1918, ed. T. Trojanowska, J. Niżyńska, P. Czapliński, University of Toronto Press 2018.
5. B. Carpenter, Monumenta Polonica: The First Four Centuries of Polish Poetry: a Bilingual Anthology, Michigan Slavic Publications 1989.
6. Cz. Miłosz, The History of Polish Literature, Updated Edition, University of California Press 1983.
7. Bruno Schulz, The Street of Crocodiles, transl. C. Wieniewska, intr. J. Ficowski, Penguin Books 1977 (or later editions).
8. Czesław Miłosz, The captive mind, transl. J. Zielonko, Vintage Books 1953 (and subsequent editions).
9. Stanisław Lem, Solaris, transl. B. Johnston, e-book edition (2011).
10. Wisława Szymborska, Nothing twice. Selected poems, wyb. i przekł. S. Barańczak i C. Cavanagh, WL 1997.