Dolls’ house. What we do not know about time Cover Image

Dom lalek. Zegar i to, czego nie wiemy o czasie
Dolls’ house. What we do not know about time

Author(s): Tadeusz Sławek
Subject(s): Language studies, Language and Literature Studies, Literary Texts, Poetry, Theoretical Linguistics, Applied Linguistics
Published by: Wydawnictwo Naukowe Uniwersytetu Szczecińskiego
Keywords: time; clock; machine; labour; life

Summary/Abstract: Jean Jacques Rousseau in his praise of Geneva notes that the most flourishing industry in this town is watch- and clock-making, the source of income of nearly one fifth of the inhabitants. As we read on, it turns out that what is at stake is not only manufacturing of mechanical chronometric devices but twisting together of social and economic life with technology and, interestingly enough, establishing an extraterrestrial, although lay, horizon for the human life. A clock did not only measure hours of our mortal existence but also remained related to the rhythms of cosmic movements of planets. Hence, starting from Tadeusz Różewicz’s poem “Dolls’ House” we are trying to demonstrate that what matters is not only the very fact of being able to survive, go on living according to the measurements of the clock, like Swift’s Gulliver who “seldom did any thing without consulting it”; what we focus on is, rather, the ability to live in a more profound way which implies a different relation with time and man’s temporality.

  • Issue Year: 16/2021
  • Issue No: 1
  • Page Range: 39-65
  • Page Count: 27
  • Language: Polish