Współczesna literatura piękna w soczewce kultury popularnej - o recepcji książek laureatów Nagrody Literackiej Nike

Abstract

The article is devoted to the reception of Nike Literary Award‑winning books between 2011 and 2013, and books which were awarded in the readers’ plebiscite that was run parallelly. Generically diverse texts of popular culture, functioning in public sphere (Internet), and being a form of reaction of particular audiences to the reading of and/or to the prize awarded to the literary works in the plebiscite or in the main contest, have been a subject to analysis. In the study, the attention has been paid to these elements which in the social reception were the conditions for the book to be read, i.e. the trade mark and logo of the most important literary award in Poland, one’s own and other people’s opinions, and the features typical of a book market product. Then, the textual category of a reader has been described, with all its popcultural determinants such as: searching for intensive sensations, novelties, almost sensual experiences and parallell worlds; identification with a character; reception through the prism of one’s own self or a tendency to choose a book on the basis of its practical dimension, with the readers’ particular fondness of detective stories or biographical novels (journals, biographies). The article ends with opinions of these readers who, aware of the fact that a particular book is important and popular “here and now”, express their opinion about it, though they are not familiar with its content, as they have not read it. The internal imperative to become recognisable in the world of media — mostly, on the Internet — makes WHAT and HOW one speaks about something less important than the fact that he/she SPEAKS ABOUT it at all.