This volume is the final output of a project started in 2013 on the occasion of the fortieth anni... more This volume is the final output of a project started in 2013 on the occasion of the fortieth anniversary of the Scandinavian Section of the University of Milan. A group of scholars working on different European and non-European cultural and literary traditions come together here to discuss the relationships between their areas of study and the Nordic countries. The range of the contributions expands over time and space, from the Middle Ages to the present day, from Poland in the east to the United States in the west, across various European countries. Through various kinds of expertise and different perspectives, this intercultural discourse deals with diverse themes, including the perception of Nordic culture(s) by foreign writers as well as the image of other cultures in Scandinavian works. In particular, the literary and cultural interchange of models and ideas between the North and other areas is investigated in a number of essays devoted to numerous authors, including, among others, Klaus Boldl, Carmen de Burgos, Carlo Emilio Gadda, Gerhart Hauptmann, Henrik Ibsen, Stieg Larsson, Carl von Linne, Rainer Maria Rilke, J.D. Salinger, Henryk Sienkiewicz, Mme de Stael, August Strindberg, and Tomas Transtromer.
... È pacifico che per una migliore comprensione del contributo, una lettura di Dwa miasta possa e... more ... È pacifico che per una migliore comprensione del contributo, una lettura di Dwa miasta possa essere d'aiuto. ... forse la personalità più celebre nata a Leopoli è quella di Leopold von Sacher-Masoch, autore non solo di Venere in pelliccia (la cui protagonista, Wanda Dunajew, ...
All'ovest di Mironczewski : alcune considerazioni sulla ricezione italiana dell&#x27... more All'ovest di Mironczewski : alcune considerazioni sulla ricezione italiana dell'opera di Miron Białoszewski (1922-1983) / L. Bernardini. - In: Comparatistica. - ISSN 1120-7094. - ISSN 2035-3294. - 14(2005), pp. 9-34. ... There are no files associated with this item.
The image of Swedes and Danes in Polish literature has been conveyed by two closely intertwined t... more The image of Swedes and Danes in Polish literature has been conveyed by two closely intertwined texts, Jan Chryzostom Pasek’s memoirs, written in the 1690s and first published in 1836, and Henryk Sienkiewicz’s novel The Deluge, published in 1886. Both texts are related to the so-called Second Northern War (1655-60) and the invasion of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth by Carl Gustav of Sweden’s armies. As Pasek took part in Stefan Czarniecki’s expedition to Denmark in 1658, he had the opportunity to visit that country and get acquainted with the habits and customs of its inhabitants. Pasek’s attention was drawn by Danish religious habits, some of which he found positively odd, but even more by their relaxed attitude towards nudity. Danish food was even more of a mistery to Pasek, a country-raised nobleman who could not possibly conceive to eat fish. A fierce Catholic and an arch-enemy of Swedish religious beliefs, Pasek was sure that a Polish knight thrown by an explosion onto the other bank of the Vistula could land safely and unscathed – himself and his horse! – because of the protection afforded to all Poles by the Holy Virgin, while the same fate could not be expected for the Swedes in a similar occurrence. Henryk Sienkiewicz made use of several episodes from Pasek’s memoirs when writing his historical novel Potop, dealing with the Swedish invasion of Poland and Lithuania in 1655-56. At times, Sienkiewicz makes use of the information he could find in Pasek’s memoirs for his own ideological goals. When Pasek mentions the Swedes’ belief in the existence of servant spirits, he treats it with a touch of humour. From that episode, Sienkiewicz, in his turn, gathers evidence that the Swedes are not real Christians, but can only counter the deep religious faith of the Poles with some sort of pagan superstition. In Sienkiewicz’s novel, the Swedes are mainly poor and therefore exceedingly hungry and greedy. Carl Gustav’s armies would supposedly have invaded Poland, a land literally dripping with milk and honey, in order to make up for the poverty of their country. Historians have provided evidence that the reasons for the Swedish invasion were not economic, but rather strategic and political. Prevented by censorship from hinting at the real causes of the destruction suffered by Lithuania in 1655, i.e., the intervention of Muscovite armies, Sienkiewicz had to develop a narrative based on a scheme that would pit the Poles against the Swedes: at the beginning of the novel, the Poles are relatively well off but absolutely passive in their military stance, whereas the Swedes are poor, hungry, greedy but a well-disciplined fighting machine. The poorer and hungrier the Poles become, because of the spoliation of their country at the hands of the invaders, the more active and heroic they will be on the battlefield; while the initially greedy and aggressive Swedes will be forced to defend themselves and their booty from a veritable ocean of popular hostility. Against the well-disciplined and rational – but unchivalrous – fighting tactics of the Swedes, the Poles employ the unpredictable and fleeing techniques of the Tartars, a population that struck irrational fear into their enemies. The Swedes are portrayed in the novel as having all the western characteristics the Poles are trying to distance themselves from: they are greedy, rational, treacherous, and are sceptical – if not altogether hostile in the way pagans would be – towards the real Christian (i.e., Roman-Catholic) faith. Drifting away from western habits, while under the pressure of an invasion that they have brought on themselves and on their country, Polish knights – in the novel, but also in the historical chronicle – seem, like peoples from the East, to be oblivious even of the Latin principle that pacta sunt servanda
Although several important scientists were born in Poland, no major Polish literary work has ever... more Although several important scientists were born in Poland, no major Polish literary work has ever been devoted to such characters as Mikołaj Kopernik or Maria Skłodowska Curie. The Polish Romantic poet Adam Mickiewicz, who could have possibly proclaimed a sort of interdict on the literary treatment of ‘hard sciences’, is at the same time the author of the first Polish attempt of a sci-fi novel. Even when, in the age of Positivism, scientists had attained their greatest social prestige, Polish literature failed to provide readers with a convincing portrait of a man of sciences, as the novel Lalka (The Doll) by Bolesław Prus attests. After the Second World War, the involvement of German science in the development of extermination techniques caused a new surge of mistrust, as far as the character of the scientist was concerned in Polish literary production. The assessed need for a new literature centered on scientific thinking, proclaimed at the Congress of the Polish Writers Union held in Szczecin in January 1949, resulted in several ‘social realistic’ literary works by – among others – Stanisław Lem, Poland’s most acclaimed sci-fi writer. Lem’s literary debuts are marked by a stress on the importance of scientific thinking as an instrument to overcome Poland’s attitude towards an irrational, ‘romantic’ way to interpret reality. From the very beginning of his literary career, Lem provided ample evidence that he was not interested in any pseudo-sciences prompted by ideological agendas, like Lysenko’s ‘contributions’ to biology, but only eager to foresee the future on the basis of a deeper knowledge of every field of modern science. Some of his anticipations – such as his belief that the acquisition of knowledge is sometimes an act of violence, or that the accumulation of data could bring science to a state of entropy – have turned out to be totally reliable. Stanisław Lem has never nurtured a naive belief in the redeeming role of science, but has always expressed his conviction that the task of science is to find out what we do not know, in order to establish what we will know tomorrow. In this, Lem can be regarded as one of the true inheritors of the traditions of European Enlightenment
This volume is the final output of a project started in 2013 on the occasion of the fortieth anni... more This volume is the final output of a project started in 2013 on the occasion of the fortieth anniversary of the Scandinavian Section of the University of Milan. A group of scholars working on different European and non-European cultural and literary traditions come together here to discuss the relationships between their areas of study and the Nordic countries. The range of the contributions expands over time and space, from the Middle Ages to the present day, from Poland in the east to the United States in the west, across various European countries. Through various kinds of expertise and different perspectives, this intercultural discourse deals with diverse themes, including the perception of Nordic culture(s) by foreign writers as well as the image of other cultures in Scandinavian works. In particular, the literary and cultural interchange of models and ideas between the North and other areas is investigated in a number of essays devoted to numerous authors, including, among others, Klaus Boldl, Carmen de Burgos, Carlo Emilio Gadda, Gerhart Hauptmann, Henrik Ibsen, Stieg Larsson, Carl von Linne, Rainer Maria Rilke, J.D. Salinger, Henryk Sienkiewicz, Mme de Stael, August Strindberg, and Tomas Transtromer.
... È pacifico che per una migliore comprensione del contributo, una lettura di Dwa miasta possa e... more ... È pacifico che per una migliore comprensione del contributo, una lettura di Dwa miasta possa essere d'aiuto. ... forse la personalità più celebre nata a Leopoli è quella di Leopold von Sacher-Masoch, autore non solo di Venere in pelliccia (la cui protagonista, Wanda Dunajew, ...
All'ovest di Mironczewski : alcune considerazioni sulla ricezione italiana dell&#x27... more All'ovest di Mironczewski : alcune considerazioni sulla ricezione italiana dell'opera di Miron Białoszewski (1922-1983) / L. Bernardini. - In: Comparatistica. - ISSN 1120-7094. - ISSN 2035-3294. - 14(2005), pp. 9-34. ... There are no files associated with this item.
The image of Swedes and Danes in Polish literature has been conveyed by two closely intertwined t... more The image of Swedes and Danes in Polish literature has been conveyed by two closely intertwined texts, Jan Chryzostom Pasek’s memoirs, written in the 1690s and first published in 1836, and Henryk Sienkiewicz’s novel The Deluge, published in 1886. Both texts are related to the so-called Second Northern War (1655-60) and the invasion of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth by Carl Gustav of Sweden’s armies. As Pasek took part in Stefan Czarniecki’s expedition to Denmark in 1658, he had the opportunity to visit that country and get acquainted with the habits and customs of its inhabitants. Pasek’s attention was drawn by Danish religious habits, some of which he found positively odd, but even more by their relaxed attitude towards nudity. Danish food was even more of a mistery to Pasek, a country-raised nobleman who could not possibly conceive to eat fish. A fierce Catholic and an arch-enemy of Swedish religious beliefs, Pasek was sure that a Polish knight thrown by an explosion onto the other bank of the Vistula could land safely and unscathed – himself and his horse! – because of the protection afforded to all Poles by the Holy Virgin, while the same fate could not be expected for the Swedes in a similar occurrence. Henryk Sienkiewicz made use of several episodes from Pasek’s memoirs when writing his historical novel Potop, dealing with the Swedish invasion of Poland and Lithuania in 1655-56. At times, Sienkiewicz makes use of the information he could find in Pasek’s memoirs for his own ideological goals. When Pasek mentions the Swedes’ belief in the existence of servant spirits, he treats it with a touch of humour. From that episode, Sienkiewicz, in his turn, gathers evidence that the Swedes are not real Christians, but can only counter the deep religious faith of the Poles with some sort of pagan superstition. In Sienkiewicz’s novel, the Swedes are mainly poor and therefore exceedingly hungry and greedy. Carl Gustav’s armies would supposedly have invaded Poland, a land literally dripping with milk and honey, in order to make up for the poverty of their country. Historians have provided evidence that the reasons for the Swedish invasion were not economic, but rather strategic and political. Prevented by censorship from hinting at the real causes of the destruction suffered by Lithuania in 1655, i.e., the intervention of Muscovite armies, Sienkiewicz had to develop a narrative based on a scheme that would pit the Poles against the Swedes: at the beginning of the novel, the Poles are relatively well off but absolutely passive in their military stance, whereas the Swedes are poor, hungry, greedy but a well-disciplined fighting machine. The poorer and hungrier the Poles become, because of the spoliation of their country at the hands of the invaders, the more active and heroic they will be on the battlefield; while the initially greedy and aggressive Swedes will be forced to defend themselves and their booty from a veritable ocean of popular hostility. Against the well-disciplined and rational – but unchivalrous – fighting tactics of the Swedes, the Poles employ the unpredictable and fleeing techniques of the Tartars, a population that struck irrational fear into their enemies. The Swedes are portrayed in the novel as having all the western characteristics the Poles are trying to distance themselves from: they are greedy, rational, treacherous, and are sceptical – if not altogether hostile in the way pagans would be – towards the real Christian (i.e., Roman-Catholic) faith. Drifting away from western habits, while under the pressure of an invasion that they have brought on themselves and on their country, Polish knights – in the novel, but also in the historical chronicle – seem, like peoples from the East, to be oblivious even of the Latin principle that pacta sunt servanda
Although several important scientists were born in Poland, no major Polish literary work has ever... more Although several important scientists were born in Poland, no major Polish literary work has ever been devoted to such characters as Mikołaj Kopernik or Maria Skłodowska Curie. The Polish Romantic poet Adam Mickiewicz, who could have possibly proclaimed a sort of interdict on the literary treatment of ‘hard sciences’, is at the same time the author of the first Polish attempt of a sci-fi novel. Even when, in the age of Positivism, scientists had attained their greatest social prestige, Polish literature failed to provide readers with a convincing portrait of a man of sciences, as the novel Lalka (The Doll) by Bolesław Prus attests. After the Second World War, the involvement of German science in the development of extermination techniques caused a new surge of mistrust, as far as the character of the scientist was concerned in Polish literary production. The assessed need for a new literature centered on scientific thinking, proclaimed at the Congress of the Polish Writers Union held in Szczecin in January 1949, resulted in several ‘social realistic’ literary works by – among others – Stanisław Lem, Poland’s most acclaimed sci-fi writer. Lem’s literary debuts are marked by a stress on the importance of scientific thinking as an instrument to overcome Poland’s attitude towards an irrational, ‘romantic’ way to interpret reality. From the very beginning of his literary career, Lem provided ample evidence that he was not interested in any pseudo-sciences prompted by ideological agendas, like Lysenko’s ‘contributions’ to biology, but only eager to foresee the future on the basis of a deeper knowledge of every field of modern science. Some of his anticipations – such as his belief that the acquisition of knowledge is sometimes an act of violence, or that the accumulation of data could bring science to a state of entropy – have turned out to be totally reliable. Stanisław Lem has never nurtured a naive belief in the redeeming role of science, but has always expressed his conviction that the task of science is to find out what we do not know, in order to establish what we will know tomorrow. In this, Lem can be regarded as one of the true inheritors of the traditions of European Enlightenment
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