Kobieta z przemalowanego portretu : opowieść o Annie Zbąskiej ze Stanisławowskich i jej "Transakcji albo Opisaniu całego życia jednej sieroty [...]"

Abstract

This book is devoted to Anna Zbąska of Stanisławscy, who was related to the wealthiest Polish houses; a person of great vigor, an independent and energetic woman with an amazing sense of observation and strong, independent personality; a woman who boldly wrote about sex. She was the author of Transakcyja... [Transaction...] — a superb study of solitude, introspection, and self-analysis, the first description of family hell, marital tyranny of life with a deviant husband. Anna was the forerunner of the changes that took place in the moral culture of the time — she blazed a trail for Polish women poets and bluestockings of the 18th century. In her text, she took up important issues concerning the identity of a woman. She answered the question of who she was and what her calling was. She could not live up to being a mother, yet she discovered a world of literature, and her treated her autobiography as a kind of self-therapy. She leads an intimate conversation with the reader; she stresses she is an introvert person not willing to confessions, yet she reveals many of her fears and quandaries. She also presents her first, unsuccessful marriage — she does it in a tragic comedy manner, as well as pays homage to her next two husbands she shared joy and happiness with. Therapy must have been successful. Last 15 years of her life was very active — she found her calling for social activity and administering her property. It is the first book concerning the author of Transakcyja... [Transaction...], aiming at presenting the life of the poet, reconstruction of her inner and emotional experience. The author of this book presented the history of her three marriages [including the first one that was annulled], portrayed the noble — magnate environment she lived in, and discussed her images, focusing mainly on the repainted portrait, which is now to be found in the Wilanów collection of the National Museum. The book consists of eight chapters, beginning with A Short View on Feminine Writing in Former Poland. It is completed by preface, conclusion, and bibliography, which constitutes the most complete set of chronologically arranged items on Anna of Stanisławscy in Polish writing and includes the first set of reproductions of the portraits of the author of Transakcyja... [Transaction...] in the literature of object, as well as personal index, and a list of illustrations.