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Number of results: 274
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Abstract

This article covers a complex relationship between the Bible and English literature from, to quote D.L. Jeffrey, ,,the swift Christianization of Britain in 7th CE [...] down to the present 'post-Christian' era". The author concentrates on and discusses the most essential results of more than thirteen centuries of this spiritual insemination, dealing mainly with a depiction of the most essential motifs and themes and occasionally commenting on various works' generic and technical aspects. Although we see that almost every writer explored biblical allusions in one way or another, emerging as the most significant developments are Anglo-Saxon poetry, Medieval drama, works of the Metaphysical poets as well as those of J. Milton, J. Bunyan and W. Blake. Having reached this peak, literature seems to have started losing interest in the Bible, or rather instead of the mission to evangelize, it preferred filling the old purport with new words and ideas, the most notorious 'deconstructionists' being Blake and his Romantic followers, decadent Swinburne and such modernists as D.H. Lawrence or J. Joyce.

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Aleksandra Kędzierska
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Abstract

Provence has been playing an important role in Russian literature for two hundred years. Numerous Russian artists have visited this French region or settled there for a longer time; enchanted by the beauty of south European nature and mild climate, they depicted it in their poems, stories or travel journals. The list includes, e.g. Semen Nadson, Alexandr Kuprin, Ivan Bunin, Sasha Chyorny, Vladimir Nabokov. Galina Kuznetsova (1900–1976), representative of the first wave of Russian emigration, spent several years in Provence. The poet lived in Grasse on and off from 1927 to 1942. Her stay on the south of France greatly influenced the journal she then wrote (Грасский дневник, 1967), and her only poetry collection published in her lifetime, entitled The Olive Garden (Оливковый сад, 1937). This article covers the Provence threads present in both texts. Kuznetsova depicts in these works the beauty of exotic nature, combining descriptions of landscape with her own emotional states, using solutions characteristic of impressionism.

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Jolanta Brzykcy
ORCID: ORCID
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Abstract

Ursula K. Le Guin was an American writer, a master of science fiction and fantasy. She was the author of the famous Earthsea trilogy, in which magic remains the pivotal idea. In the novels, Le Guin links immense, yet dangerous, supernatural abilities with the idea of Equlibrium within realms, a principle that governs the universe. The paper is an attempt to elucidate how certain visions of life after death are constellated within Le Guin’s fantasy writings. Visibly inspired by Eastern mythologies and religious doctrines, the author does not steer clear from the vision rooted in Western traditions. The ongoing debate is an attempt at clarifying the universal concept of soul and mankind.
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Ewa Wiśniewska
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Abstract

The 2014/2015 revolution at the Kiev Maidan (and elsewhere in Ukraine) made a wide-ranging impact on the literature. In this paper I analyse diaries devoted to the events of the dignity revolution. I have selected three texts written in three different languages: “ Приватний щоденник ” by Marija Matios (in Ukrainian). “ Дневник Майдана ” by Adrjej Kurkov (in Russian) and “Ogień Majdanu. Dziennik rewolucji 22.11.2013– 22.02.2014” (in Polish). These texts are highly interesting mostly because they allow looking at the Maidan through the eyes of witnesses. Because of that we do not receive mere facts, but a testimony which tells us most about the people involved, represented by the specific author reporting their experiences, impressions, emotions, and thoughts. It is characteristic for the personal document literature that it is positioned somewhere between the events being described and the internal experiences, judgements and preferences of the author. It is shaped by their knowledge, experience, and moral code. These texts often con- centrate on the fates of specific individuals, their behaviours, the reasons and consequences thereof. They differ both in terms of the form and the motivations of the authors. They are all, however, rather unique, because they speak of the events of most recent history which so violently cut through the daily lives of Ukrainian citizens.

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Katarzyna Jakubowska-Krawczyk
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Abstract

This paper intends to present an semantic and cultural analysis of Rabī‛ Jābir’s novel Druzes of Belgrade. Published in 2011, the story deals with a period in Slavic history of the 19th century that parallels the reality of Middle East in the same time. The aim of the contribution is to examine the narrative context of historical events in the hero’s life which are narrated primarily through the juxtaposition of historical facts. Distinctions that are made between the real and the imaginary in the novel are bound to mystify – perhaps even mask – the historical and cultural relationship between Arab and Slavs. The writer is not only involved in producing the story of the mutual Arab – Slavic (co)existence within the Ottoman empire in Lebanon and Balkan as well, but is equally intent on providing the story behind the (hi)story. As a mode of representing reality the analysed literary work isn’ t neutral; it presupposes system of moral values which underlies the Arab Christian hero’s factual statements connected with the powerstructure and power-relations of the Ottoman society the protagonist lives in. Between history and narrative literature exists a relationship of complementarity that can only enrich and deepen reader’s understanding of a given culture and society. The narrative representations of historical facts in the novel Druzes of Belgrade are semantic and philosophical operations and as such can be misrepresentations according to Rabī‛ Jābir’s literary tendency in a specific historical and intellectual setting.

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František Ondráš
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Abstract

Ludwik Bohdan Grzeniewski (1930–2008) was Polish essayist, poet, critic and novelist. He was born and died in Warsaw, where he spent all his life. Well known as varsavianist, he was also master of literary miniature. It is not a literary genre in the strict sense. “Literary miniature”, coherent artistic statement, as short as possible, combines elements of poem, essay, short narrative and others. Grzeniewski always highly valued precision, he preferred condensed form of expression. I therefore think, that the books of this writer (Igły w stogu siana, “Drobiazgów duch, wspaniały i powietrzny…”, Taniec z mufką and others) deserve attention.

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Jan Tomkowski
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Abstract

Julius Margolin (1900–1971), a Jewish author of Russian and Polish origins, wrote his famous Russian-language novel A Journey to the Land Zeka in pre-State Israel, one year after his release from a Soviet concentration camp (1946–1947). Having been one of the earliest testimonies about Stalin’s atrocities, this book was published in 1952 in its abridged version, whereas the unabridged version came out only in 2016. While the social and political significance of this book has been repeatedly discussed, its poetical and discursive strategies are understudied. This article makes a few steps in the direction of understanding of Margolin’s book seriocomic style, discourse of fairytale and fantasy, the Palestine-Zionist text, the sea motif and other themes. The analysis unveils the author’s ambitious literary project that hides behind the historical testimony and is intended to strengthen it.

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Roman Katsman
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Abstract

Egyptian writer ʼIhsān ‛Abd al-Quddūs is one of the most prolific contemporary Arab writers and gained great popularity, especially in his country, but also all over the Arab world. The author deals with issues considered by society, including literature, taboos as the relationship between man and woman outside the context of marriage, the description of physical contacts, carnal and passionate love, prostitution, drugs, and the emancipation of women. In his stories he was interested in the feelings of the human being and in his relationship with the society. Al-Quddūs can be regarded as one of the most multifaceted intellectuals in the whole Arab world: in addition to being a writer and journalist of great popularity, he also occupied a prominent place in Egyptian cinema. ʼIhsān ‛Abd al-Quddūs was a provocative artist of great popularity in his time, but little known in the West, because of the scarceness of translated texts. Through the translation and analysis of his works it is possible to open up a wider glimpse into the knowledge of contemporary Arab literature.

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Emanuela De Blasio
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Abstract

This article presents an overview of a literary sketch The Bathing Beaches on the Baltic Coast in the West Guberniyas… by Faddei Bulgarin (1789-1859), first published in Russian in 1827 (“Severnaya Pchela”, № 122-125) and in 1828 in Polish (“Kolumb”, vol. 1, № 4). The interpretive context for the story is founded on author’s journeys across the Baltic region and his stay in Karlov near Dorpat as well as development of the resorts by the Baltic Sea. Bulgarin’s sketch was the first description of Palanga (Polish: Połąga) as a seaside resort town. Among other elements of the writing the article discusses its composition and style, focusing primarily on a number of descriptive features concerning: the sea, the land, the nature, entertainments, local inhabitants and travellers and their customs.

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Magdalena Dąbrowska
Piotr Głuszkowski
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Abstract

Kazimierz Jaworski contributed to a great extent to popularising Yevhen Malaniuk’s poetry in the interwar period. Most of Jaworski’s translations of Malaniuk’s poems into Polish were published in the years 1933–1937 in the magazine Kamena in Chełm. The poet from Lublin undertook to translate less popular poems, unknown to Polish readers. He opted not to work with the Ukrainian poet’s patriotic works, familiar to Polish literary circles, and chose poems of intimate and existential nature instead. From the two collections which were known in Poland, Earth And Iron (1930) and The Earthly Madonna (1934), he selected poems which in a special way correlate with his own lyrical works from the To a Red And White Mistress (1924) collection. What deserves special attention among Kazimierz Jaworski’s translating techniques is his exceptional diligence in choosing suitable Polish semantic equivalents and in rendering an appropriate rhythm of poems. Most of his translations can be described as adequate. They are not absolute, but they convey the originality of a given work through preserving the form and contents of the translated poem in the most faithful way possible. Jaworski’s translations show his inclination to poetise and dynamise the text. The translator readily uses his own metaphors and expands phrases with emotionally charged elements. Kazimierz Andrzej Jaworski was also a tireless propagator of information concerning the most recent translations of Yevhen Malaniuk’s poetry as well as the publishing activities of one of the most valued representatives of the Ukrainian immigration in Poland.

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Anna Choma-Suwała
ORCID: ORCID
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Abstract

The work of the Belgian writer Nicole Malinconi is largely in line with the tendency to fragmentarity, which in addition to hybridism and collage is one of the main trends of post-modern narratives. In her works, fragmentarity is manifested in the form of a short story, which the author herself calls the brève. The article is an analysis of the characteristics of the short form, proper for Malinconi, and especially for its socially engaged works in which it performs important functions. The short story, through its brevity and the resulting intensity, interacts more easily with the reader. It also gains considerable critical power.
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Judyta Zbierska-Mościcka
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Abstract

After the collapse of the Democratic Republic of Azerbaijan in April 1920, the Azerbaijani intellectual and political elites suffered repressions from the Bolshevik authorities. The most prominent figures had to leave the country fearing for their lives. Among them was the renowned journalist, publicist and head of the Musavat party - Mehemmed Emin Resulzade. Fearing the Bolshevik expansion westwards, Polish authorities strived to weaken and destroy the Soviet Union's integrity. Their goal was to create a "sanitary cordon" of independent states between Poland and Bolshevik Russia. Thanks to the direct financial support from the Polish government, the political emigration from Azerbaijan, Georgia, North Caucasus and other states published their magazines and newspapers. In the second half of the 20th century, there was a political rapprochement between Turkey and the Soviet Union. As a result, the political situation of anti-Soviet emigration worsened. Therefore, the main burden of Azerbaijani emigration, headed by Resulzade, moved over the Vistula. The Polish period was very important for the publishing activities of the whole Azerbaijani emigration, represented by Resulzade. He mainly contributed to anti-Soviet press, tied to the Promethean movement, but not only. The author will present here rarely known Resulzade articles on other topics. The article also presents his book in Polish Azerbaijan in its Fight for Independence.

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Shahla Kazimova
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Abstract

The purpose of this article is to establish a frame for arranging and classifying observations relating to the indigenous knowledge and oral traditions of the San people of southern Africa, mainly in Namibia. Oral literature of the San people serve, therefore, as a valuable source for re-constructing and reinforcing a positive collective identity of their history and cultural diversity. Several forms of expression such as folklore, poems, plants' names and personal narratives will be provided.

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Patrycja Kozieł
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Abstract

The debate around the relations between Christians and Jews has recently become one of the discussed issues in the cultural Israeli world. This article examines the references to Christianity and to Jesus in the contemporary Israeli fiction. Through the analysis of some literary works produced by the best-know Israeli writers, we will try to describe the way the authors deal with Christian elements and explore their personal considerations. In particular a great attention will be devoted to Amos Oz’s last novel Judas, published in 2014. The story is based on the life of a young student who is writing a doctoral dissertation on “How Jews see Jesus” but it ends up focusing on the figure of Judas. In revealing the intent of his research the protagonist presents a detailed investigation of the Jewish attitude towards Christians quoting sources from the ancient times until today. Through Oz’s book it is possible to explore the complex relationship between Christians and Jews and offers new starting points for the future debates.
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Maddalena Schiavo
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Abstract

The given article is an analysis of Władysław Wężyk’s Travels to the ancient world taking into consideration the most important problems and components of the 19th century Romantic worldview. Particular attention will be paid to the great Romantic themes such as folklore, art, music, spontaneous literary works and concepts of new humanity. Wężyk’s memoir reveals his openness towards the Other and the understanding of foreign cultures which is by far the most important feature of a Romantic intellectual.

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Monika Janota
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Abstract

The Koran became an inspiration to the Russian poet Alexander Pushkin (1799–1837), made obvious in many of his works, such as Imitations of the Koran, The Prophet, and In a Secret Cave. Pushkin studied the translation of the Koran carefully and used many verses of its Surahs in his texts. Many of his contemporary poets and followers were influenced by his poetry, like Ivan Bunin (1870–1953), who continued the traditions of Pushkin. Bunin repeated many thoughts from Koranic discourse and placed them in his poems that were full of faith and spirituality. He wrote many of them at the beginning of the 20th century1, before his emigration to France in 1918, for example: Mohammed in Exile, Guiding Signs and For Treason. It has been noted that Bunin was quoting verses from the Koran to create an intertextual relationships between some Surahs and his poems, showing a great enthusiasm to mystical dimension of Islam. We find this aspect in many works, such as The Night of al-Qadr, Tamjid, Black Stone of the Kaaba, Kawthar, The Day of Reckoning and Secret. It can also be said that a spiritual inspiration and rhetoric of Koran were not only attractive to Pushkin and Bunin, but also to a large group of Russian poets and writers, including Gavrila Derzhavin, Mikhail Lermontov, Fyodor Tyutchev, Yakov Polonsky, Lukyan Yakubovich, Konstantin Balmont, and others.

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Yousef Sh’hadeh
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Abstract

Contemporary Arabic literature is slowly approaching a local production of the “fantasy” genre through attempts that can be considered an important starting point for this new genre still being defined in the Arab world. During the last decades the influence exerted by Western countries on the production of this literary genre, that reaches the Arab world around the twentieth century, has been evident mainly through the translations of Western fantasy novels. Among the various genres of fantasy novels which still enjoy international fame and have been translated into Arabic we find: The Lord of the Rings (1954–55) by John Ronald Reuel Tolkien; A Song of Ice and Fire (1996–2005) by Raymond Richard Martin and Harry Potter (1997–2007) by Joanne Kathleen Rowling. The delay in the introduction of the fantasy genre in the Arab countries has begun to be overcome in recent years, in fact many Arab authors have tried to write new fantasy novels. The fantastic tradition of Arab Islamic civilization is also an important part of drawing on the creation of original fantasy works. The study shows a general propensity of the contemporary Arab world to create a local fantasy, in which the Arab authors try to put the accent on the characteristic elements of Middle Eastern culture, though also drawing on the Western fantasy tradition.

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Emanuela De Blasio
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Abstract

The great 13th century scholar Yāqūt al-Hamawī, compiled his well-known geographical dictionary – Mucğam al-Buldān – using an incredibly vast corpus of sources that allowed him to describe the lands lying beyond the realm of Islam. The aim of this paper is to identify the sources he used to describe issues dealing with the Slavs or those peoples and areas thought by Arab writers to belong to or be connected with the Slavs. The results shed some light on the state of knowledge of this area among 13th century inhabitants of the caliphate. At the same time, the author’s analysis of the methods employed to compose the material on the Slavs that appears in the Dictionary helped determine the aim and the role of this work in the caliphate.

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Barbara Ostafin
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Abstract

The object of our deliberations is structuralism in literary studies, whose beginnings in Poland can be traced back to the thirties of the 20th century. It was developing at two centres at the time: at the Stefan Batory University in Vilnius, around Professor Manfred Kridl, and at the University of Warsaw. Structuralism was reborn in Poland in the sixties and it impacted all of literary studies; its main centres were: the Institute of Literary Research of the Polish Academy of Sciences and the Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań. Focusing on the analysis of literary systems, it combined them with theory of text and interpretation of individual works, emphasizing their broadly understood linguistic, discursive and rhetorical properties. In the culmination stage of its advancement, it tackled the fundamental problems of our discipline, including those that were only starting to emerge, such as reception of literary works as intended by its structural properties, or intertextuality. Structuralism had (and still has) a strong impact on the entirety of literary studies in Poland. It also became a sphere of reference for researchers of the younger generation, who prefer newer methodological tendencies.

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Michał Głowiński
Grzegorz Wołowiec
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Abstract

The article discusses the matter of portraying Suleiman I the Magnificent in 16th century Croatian and Slovakian literature. The source material comprises three texts: Ferenc Črnko’s Croatian chronicle titled Podsjedanje i osvojenje Sigeta [The Siege and Capture of Siget], the Croatian epic tale Vazetje Sigeta grada [The Caputure of Siget Town] by Brne Karnarutić and the Slovakian anonymous historical song Píseň o Sigetském zámku [A Song about Siget Castle]. By looking at these texts the author hereof contemplates what image of the Turkish ruler has been recorded in Slavic literatures.

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Monika Sagało
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Abstract

A review of Walentyna Sobol’s edition of a part of the Diary of Pylyp Orlyk, covering the years 1725–1726. The publication of the work of one of the champions of Ukrainian statehood, written in exile, takes on a symbolic dimension as it coincides with Ukraine’s struggle against Moscow’s aggression.
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Myrosław Trofymuk
1
ORCID: ORCID

  1. Katedra Prasy Ukraińskiej, Wydział Dziennikarstwa, Lwowski Uniwersytet Narodowy im. Iwana Franki
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Abstract

In this contribution, a further parallel between the Akkadian and Egyptian literature is highlighted. The comparison between the lover and a wolf will be of crucial importance. The material consists of one Akkadian example and three Egyptian examples. The radius of the Egyptian formulation then expanded to include other examples.
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Authors and Affiliations

Stefan Bojowald
1
ORCID: ORCID

  1. University of Bonn, Germany
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Abstract

We talk to Prof. Jerzy Jarzębski from the Jagiellonian University in Kraków and the Eastern Europe State University in Przemyśl about Stanisław Lem and the future he foresaw, his cautionary tales and whether he is still an author often misunderstood.

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Authors and Affiliations

Jerzy Jarzębski

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