Abstract:The article raises the question about the ways in which religious tradition can become an ally in the process of acculturation while serving the modern subject both as a springboard for innovative, creative work and as a tool of self-improvement. Czesław Miłosz's selected works from his second stay in the United States (1961States ( -1980 are analysed from the postsecular perspective which recognises religion as a full-fledged actor in the process of modern transformations that may broaden the field of artistic choice but remains vulnerable to artistic resemantizations or even profanations (Agamben). Such an analysis allows us to interpret the poem From the Rising of the Sun as a form of reconciliation of Miłosz's American and Lithuanian experience (as well as of maturity and childhood, centre and periphery, modern and pre-modern cultural formation) through textual practices inspired by his private Liturgy of the Hours. In this light, the translations of the Books of the Bible on which Miłosz worked, his novel The Mountains of Parnassus, as well as his essays from Visions from San Francisco Bay emerge as instruments of shaping the communal identity with the use of pre-existing rituals, which are, nonetheless, also negotiated in the act of writing.Keywords: modernity, postsecularism, Polish literature, migration, translation, Czesław Miłosz Dislocations that occur between villages and cities, states, continents, languages and cultures, as well as translocations of political borders that might result in a changed citizenship despite remaining in one place: these and other forms of a more often than not compulsory migration marked the life of Czesław Miłosz. The poet was a provincial tourist and a resident, a subaltern, a refugee, an embassy worker, an outcast, a pilgrim, a guest, an academic nomad and a repatriate. The diversity of this experience and its extent over time (Miłosz lived for 93 years) implies a multiplicity of communities, to which the poet might claim his right in the process of constructing his identity.He most frequently identified his experience as specific for the twentieth century and characteristic for the societies of the Central and Eastern Europe, pointing to his sense of belonging to the cosmopolitan circle of intellectuals in the first place and the Polish literary emigrées in the second (see : Milosz 1968, Miłosz 2007, Miłosz 1997. These and other auto-identification gestures, however, did not mean that he welcomed becoming subordinated to pre-existing constructs, but that he was willing to work on their critical actualisation. It is exactly this attitude that stands behind the originality, the substantial interpretative potential and the influence of Miłosz's work, leading it in various creative directions that cut across linguistic and generic boundaries. An insightful reflection on this subject is provided by Ryszard Nycz, who uses a quote from Miłosz's poem Po ziemi naszej "Gdziekolwiek jesteś, nie zdołasz być obcy" (Wherever you are, you cannot be a stranger) to identify ...
W artykule analizie poddane zostają relacje pomiędzy koncepcją kanonu literackiego Harolda Blooma a statusem jego własnej twórczości krytycznej. Rożne tematy i style pisarstwa uprawianego przez autora Lęku przed wpływem zostały scharakteryzowane i ocenione pod kątem ich kanoniczności, rozumianej jako wartość estetyczna i społeczna. Według samego Blooma teksty kanoniczne oferują także wartość duchową, za pomocą takich narzędzi jak ironia i metafora, prowokując czytelników do poznawania własnej kondycji. Artykuł zdaje także sprawę z polskiej recepcji pism Blooma oraz porusza kwestię sposobu, w jaki literatura polska jest obecna w zaprojektowanym przez niego zachodnim kanonie. Jej słaba reprezentacja domaga się odpowiedzi krytyków, którzy mogliby zaproponować własną listę dzieł, według kryteriów podobnie mocnych jak te Bloomowskie, lecz przezwyciężających jego – niejednokrotnie kolonizatorski, patriarchalny i ekskluzywistyczny – wpływ. Reading Harold Bloom – What For and How? On Canonicality of the Critic The relationship between the idea of Harold Bloom’s literary canon and the status of his own critic’s oeuvre is discussed in the article. Diverse topics and literary styles cultivated by the author of The Anxiety of Influence were characterised and evaluated from the perspective of their canonicality understood as an aesthetic and social value. According to Bloom himself, the canonical texts also offer the spiritual value with help of such tools as irony and metaphor, provoking the readers to assess their own condition. The article presents the Polish reception of Harold Bloom’s texts and examines the presence of Polish literature in the Western literary canon designed by him. Its weak representation demands response of the critics who could propose their own list of literary works based on criteria equally strong as Bloom’s ones but overcoming his oftentimes colonial, patriarchal and exclusionary influence.
Artur Sandauer’s Translation of the Bible as a Medium of Literary Conversion to Modern Marranism The article considers Bible translation as a potentially converting experience for the translator and for the readers. It is a case study of the work of an important Polish literary critic, Artur Sandauer, who in 1977 translated the Book of Genesis and published it with an extensive commentary, becoming a part of a “biblical boom” that happened in Poland from 1965 to 1985 (as a result of the Second Vatican Council). Numerous translations of the Bible were initiated at that time by both religious institutions and lay individuals of various backgrounds. Sandauer, a Holocaust survivor, was one of the last such translators and his attitude towards existing denominations was particularly complicated. The article identifies textual strategies that he uses to challenge the sanctity of the Bible, aiming for spiritual independence of himself and the potential reader. This type of postsecular, literature-oriented biblical translation has the hallmarks of a conversion text, although the change that would be made in the translator and the reader is unstable, and, as such, akin to the status of a modern marrano.
Kanon(y) i wspólnoty -uwagi wstępne Canon(s) and Communities -Introductory RemarksOd publikacji książki Kanon i obrzeża pod redakcją Ingi Iwasiów i Tatiany Czerskiej minęło ponad 15 lat, w ciągu których polska humanistyka przeszła daleką drogę. Postępujące umiędzynarodowienie kultury i nauki zaowocowało wzmożoną refleksją na temat miejsca polskich tekstów artystycznych w kanonie literatury światowej -czemu poświęcony był pierwszy numer ubiegłorocznych "Kontekstów Kultury" 1 . Przyszedł czas na podjęcie osobnego namysłu nad pytaniem o to, jak zmienił się -i wciąż zmienia -polski kanon literacki, jakie kryteria o tym decydują i jaka wspólnota narodowa wyłania się w tym procesie. Być może, jak sugerujemy w tytule numeru, zamiast prób definiowania jednego kanonu i jednej wspólnoty wypada uznać, że we współczesnej Polsce mamy do czynienia z pluralizmem obu tych, wzajemnie powiązanych, fenomenów. O wielości kanonów można też mówić w odniesieniu do kanonu narodowego i transnarodowego, które mogą siebie wzajemnie określać, mogą też ze sobą konkurować 2 .Prezentowany numer zadaje pytanie nie tylko o uwarunkowania kanonu literatury w lokalnym kontekście kulturowym, ale także o kanon jako taki: Jak się staje? Czym jest? Do klasycznych pozycji na ten temat należy Zachodni kanon Harolda Blooma niedawno przetłumaczony na język polski (Warszawa 2019). Na pytanie o źródło kanoniczności amerykański krytyk odpowiada: jest nim
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