Oral Systems in Kosmos by Witold Gombrowicz Cover Image

Układy oralne w Kosmosie Witolda Gombrowicza
Oral Systems in Kosmos by Witold Gombrowicz

Author(s): Tomasz Kaliściak
Subject(s): Language and Literature Studies, Studies of Literature, Polish Literature, Sociology of Literature
Published by: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Jagiellońskiego
Keywords: mouth; orality; family; nonheteronormativity; masculinity; Witold Gombrowicz; Jean Genet

Summary/Abstract: The article attempts to describe Witold Gombrowicz’s oral system in Kosmos from the perspective of cultural interpretations of psychoanalysis (Jean-Paul Sartre, Guy Hocquenghem, Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick) and schizoanalysis (Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari). Understood as a specific network of connections that organizes the map of Witold’s unconscious mind, this system focuses on the mouth, tongue/language, speaking, eating, etc. The fantasy of spitting in the mouth plays a significant role here, read in the context of a similar motif from Jean Genet’s novel Miracle de la rose. The novel interpretation revolves around an attempt to escape from the power of the Oedipus complex, presented as a network of familial heteronormative relationships and connections. The failure of heterosexuality is treated as an act of queer resistance.

  • Issue Year: 2022
  • Issue No: 54
  • Page Range: 37-60
  • Page Count: 24
  • Language: Polish