Twórczy lęk Słowackiego : antagonizm wieszczów po latach

Abstract

Manfred Kridl’s 1925 publication Antagonism between the Poet-prophets – on Słowacki’s Attitude to Mickiewicz, consolidates a model that considers the complicated relationship between the two most outstanding poets of Polish Romanticism in terms of competition and polemics, the active part of which was that of the younger poet. The attractiveness of the metaphor proposed by Kridl seems to result, above all, from its systematizing nature, but also from the fact that it is based on both analysis of Słowacki’s and Mickiewicz’s output and on biographical detail. Although the analysis conducted by Kridl is interesting and in many aspects still accurate (despite a rapid increase in critical works devoted to texts written by both poets), the formula of antagonism between the poet-prophets itself does not seem broad enough to describe their complicated relationship. The postulate, in reconsidering this issue, has been formulated by researchers several times (especially in the context of the latter Genesis period of Słowacki’s writing, where the rules of competition for poetic fame or even worldview polemic seem particularly inadequate). The book is an attempt to present the complicated relations between Słowacki and Mickiewicz in a broader formula, derived from Harold Bloom’s ‘anxiety of influence‘ theory. The concept of this American researcher involves noting the complex process of working out the influence of a great precursor in the series of references to his works. The aim of these measures is to achieve poetic maturity and originality. The considerations made in the book concentrate on three thematic lines: love, nation, and poetic art, while their intention is not so much the subordination of Słowacki’s particular texts to subsequent revisionary ratios described by Bloom, as a description of the complicated relationship between the poets within the formula of the ‘anxiety of influence‘, the nature of which is a creative differentiation from the precursor. The last chapter of the book follows the nature of an interpretative experiment, proposing a hypothesis to explain the insignificant number (and nature) of Mickiewicz’s comments on the younger poet’s output. The role of methodological inspiration was again Bloom’s theory here. Bloom’s concept clearly underlines not only the doubly marked attitude of an ephebe to a master (admiration and worship combine here with fear and necessity to oppose his dominance), but also shows the positive consequences of the mechanism. At the same time, the nature of the relationship between the poet-prophets may be moved from the space of ‘competition’ for fame and poetic precedence into the sphere of creating one’s own interesting works different from the achievements of ‘the other’ (though being tightly connected with it). It is evident that a typical feature of Słowacki’s works is their intertextuality, (using other texts in order to create one’s own original whole) and a complex game with a literary tradition. Mickiewicz’s works serve not only as one of the most important literary contexts to which the younger poet refers, but they are also given a special place among his ‘inspirations’. Bloom’s ‘anxiety of influence‘ theory allows this specificity to be captured.