Góry „na opak”. O nowej tendencji w ramach mountaineering non fiction
“The Upside Down” Mountains. On a New Trend in the Mountaineering Non-fiction

Summary/Abstract: Mountain climbing is considered one of the symptoms of European modernity, allowing one to follow changes in culture and finding reflection in literature. Texts about mountaineering, despite their extraordinary popularity among readers, do not arouse much interest among researchers. Hence, the aim of the article is to fill this research gap. The author analyzes a new tendency that emerged in the Polish mountaineering non-fiction with the publication of Olga Morawska’s book Góry na opak, czyli rozmowy o czekaniu [The upside down mountains or a conversation about waiting] in 2011. In a collection of conversations conducted by the Himalayan’s widow with relatives of Polish climbers (including Wanda Rutkiewicz, Jerzy Kukuczka, Andrzej Zawada), there was a significant reversal of personal and spatial perspectives. High mountain expeditions are discussed by people who have not been there, whereas the highest peaks of the earth are shown from a distance and from a low point of view. This leads to questions about a sender, hero and recipient, as well as goals of not only the above-mentioned book by Morawska, but also many similar publications in the field of mountaineering non-fiction (e.g. by Anna Kamińska, Beata Sabała-Zielińska, Katarzyna Zdanowicz). The issues related to the literary topography of mountains take on a new dimension. Using tools provided by geopoetics, the article formulates the thesis that in these works the mountain space is determined not as much by direct experiences and professional descriptions of climbing as by emotions. In stories about, sensual landscapes are replaced by intimate spaces and emotive topographies. With these shifts, traditionally highly masculinized mountaineering writing has seen a greater emergence of women’s stories and narratives about the trauma of fatal accidents while conquering the highest peaks.

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