Literature for God’s sake! Translation, poetry and novels. On artistic motivation for the evolution of Marian Pankowski’s writing in view of his correspondence with Jerzy Giedryć
Burnatowski Jan
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Bilingualism as the strength which converts individual literary programs is exampled by Marian Pankowski’s literary work from the 1950s and his correspondence with Jerzy Giedroyc. The article discusses three research questions: 1. the sources of artistic transition of Marian Pankowski works; 2. the reasons of suspending cooperation with the monthly “Kultura”; 3. the circumstances surrounding the formation of the Polish contemporary literature canon. Bilingualism which resulted from decision to remain in Belgium after the Second World War allowed not only for the participation in the artistic and intellectual life of the country but also for cooperation with “Kultura” of Jerzy Giedroyc. The contact with the Belgium culture, which signifi cantly differed form Polish, fostered Pankowski’s translations from Polish to French and French to Polish. Belgian avanguard artist, Michel de Ghederode, whom Pankowski met in 1955 (when preparing translation of drama “Hop Signior”) had a formative infl uence on the author of “Matuga”. Due to this process of changing the artistic assumptions was triggered. That kind of literary invention, the inner move of Marian Pankowski writing, which was heavily infl uenced by the Belgian elements, was opposite to Polish tradition and it resulted in the marginalization of Pankowski’s status in the Polish culture. The conclusion concerning artistic reasons for suspending cooperation with “Kultura”, based on studies on letters between Pankowski and Giedroyc, challenges the predominant political interpretation.
The sample of Polish version of this article is available here: https://tekstualia.pl/files/bff29ed8/burnatowski_jan-literature.pdf
