No CrossRef data available.
Article contents
Mickiewicz' Konrad Wallenrod: An Allegory of the Conflict Between Politics and Art
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 25 January 2017
Extract
Modern readers and critics of Konrad Wallenrod have long been perplexed over the nature of the poem as an artistic entity, and over its essential meaning and possible allegorical significance. More than this, critics have encountered great difficulty in attempting to relate the poem to Mickiewicz' artistic, moral and political development. For example, those who read the poem strictly in ethico-political terms have become much exercized over the problem of its alleged immorality and have encountered great difficulty in relating this work to the development of Mickiewicz' political ideas and attitudes. For the literary historian, the problem of explaining why this work differs so radically from the other poetry written during the first two years of Mickiewicz' Russian exile remains the single most important issue.
- Type
- Research Article
- Information
- Copyright
- Copyright © Association for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies 1960
References
1 Mickiewicz, Adam, Dzieła (16 tomy, Warszawa, 1955), XIV, str. 315–16. Unless otherwise noted, subsequent references to the Polish text of Mickiewicz' writings are taken from this edition.Google Scholar
2 Ibid., str.388.
3 Manfred, Kridl, Adam Mickiewicz, Poet of Poland (New York, 1951), p.19.Google Scholar
4 Wiktor, Weintraub, The Poetry of Adam Mickiewicz(The Hague, 1954), pp.122 and 124.Google Scholar
5 Stefan Zołkiewski, Spdór o Mickiewicza (Wrocław, 1952), str. 105 Google Scholar
6 Stanisław Kolbuszewski, Piéśn o Aldony Losach (Poznań, 1927), str.22–27.Google Scholar
7 Weintraub, op. cit., pp. 123-24.
8 The results of Ujejski's researches are presented in his introductory essay to the edition of Konrad Wallenrod in Bibljoteka Naradowa, Serja I, Nr.72 (Kraków, 1924) and in more detail in Byronizm i skottyzm w “Konradzie Wallenrodzie” (Kraków, 1923).Google Scholar
9 Marion Coleman, Young Mickiewicz (Cambridge Springs, Pennsylvania, 1956), p.249.Google Scholar
10 Józef Kallenbach, Adam Mickiewicz (2 tomy, Warszawa, 1923, 3-go wyd.), I, 372.Google Scholar
11 Cf. his essay in C. Mills (ed.), Adam Mickiewicz, 1798–1855, Selected Poems (New York, 1956), p.42.Google Scholar
12 Henryk, Szyper, Adam Mickiewicz: poeta i czlowiek czynu (Warszawa, 1947), str. 97–98.Google Scholar
13 Stanislaw Szpotánski, Adam Mickiewicz i jego epoka (3 tomy, Warszawa, 1921), I, str. 163–69.
14 Juliusz Kleiner, Mickiewicz (2 tomy, Lublin, 1948), II, 1, str. 84; 126–27. Unfortunately, Kleiner does not develop this in detail or go on to show how this imagery operates within the poem.Google Scholar
15 Noyes, G.R., Poems by Adam Mickiewicz (New York, 1944), p.23.Google Scholar
16 Władysław, Mickiewicz, Adam Mickiewicz: sa vie et son oeuvre (Paris, 1888), p. 91.Google Scholar
17 Cf. his essay in Adam Mickiewicz (UNESCO, 1955), pp. 83–85 Google Scholar
18 Zólkiewski, op.cit., str. 106.Google Scholar
19 Mieczysław Giergielewicz, Drogi Mickiewicza (London, 1945), str. 71 Google Scholar
20 Wacław, Lednicki, Bits of Table Talk on Pushkin, Mickiewicz, Goethe, Turgenev and Sienkiewicz (The Hague, 1956), p.115 Google Scholar
21 See his essay on “Mickiewicz and European Romanticism” in the UNESCO collection of essays cited above, p. 48.Google Scholar
22 Lednicki, loc. cit.
23 Weintraub, op. cit., pp. 126–27.
24 Among Mickiewicz contemporaries a notable parallel exists in Mazzini, who, though he never acquired an independent literary reputation, considered his “first great sacrifice” to have been the abandonment of literary aspirations for a political career. See Hales, E. E. Y., Mazzini and the Secret Societies (New York, 1957), p . 35.Google Scholar
25 The English translation of Konrad Wallenrod quoted throughout this article is from G. R. Noyes, op.cit., pp. 165–228. When necessary for clarity, Polish lines are given in brackets or footnotes.
26 Dzieła, XIV, 349.
27 The Polish lines (Ibid., II, 74) read as follows: “Konrad nie słynął w przydwornym nacisku/Gładkością. mowy”; “Od czarującej rozmowy ucieka”; and “Na żarty dworzan żartami odstrzelał/I sypał damon grzecznych stowek krocie,/Z zimnym uśmiechem, jak dzieciom łakocie.”
28 Ibid., str. 120: “A ty A l … manzor,—precz mi z oczu, stary—/Precz mi z Albanem—samego zostawcie!”Google Scholar
29 The simplicity and clarity of the original lines (Ibid., str. 83) is somehow lost in the translation: “Serce i potok ostrzegać daremnie,/ Dziewica kocha i Wilija bieży;/ Wilija znikła w ukochanym Niemnie,/ Dziewica placze w pustelniczej wieży.”
30 Ibid., str. 92: “Gdy dobrowolnie dla szczęścia umarlem.”
31 The biblical sources of these Samson images were worked out by Barbara Kiefer Lewalski.
32 Mickiewicz compressed several lines from chapter eighteen of The Prince into the following epigraph:Dovete adunque sapere, come sono due generazioni da combattere … bisogna essere volpe e leone.Google Scholar
33 Dzieła,l, 193–94
34 Ibid., str. 231–32.
35 Ibid., XIV, 283
36 Ibid., str. 291; 317; 469.
37 Ibid., V, 258
38 Ibid., str. 379–82. Permission, however, was refused.
39 A. E. Odyniec, Listy z podróży (4 tomy, Warszawa, 1884, 2-go wyd.), I, 53.
40 Dzieła, I, 329–30.
41 Odyniec, op. cit., I, 134.
42 Ibid., str. 318
43 Ibid., II, 157–60.
44 According to several scholars, the images used by Mickiewicz in this poem are based upon allusions to a Rafael painting. Cf. Noyes, op. cit., p. 451, Weintraub, op. cit., p. 147 and Lednicki, loc. cit.
45 Dzieła, II, 153.