Wynajdywanie „narodowego miejsca” w polskich powieściach pouwłaszczeniowych
Inventing the “National Space” in Polish Post-Abolition of Serfdom Novels

Summary/Abstract: This paper attempts to reconstruct the process of the parallel invention of a national community and a “national place” (Michael Billig) in Polish novels written after the abolition-of-serfdom reforms carried out by foreign authorities. The issue is presented within the context of landownership conflicts between noble landowners and peasants who were freed from serfdom by foreign authorities. Excerpts from the novels of Eliza Orzeszkowa, Henryk Sienkiewicz, Bolesław Prus, Wacław Sieroszewski, Władysław Reymont, Maria-Jehanne Wielopolska, Maria Rodziewicz, Kazimierz Laskowski, and Franciszek Tuczyński are interpreted in light of the findings on post-enfranchisement social relations made by historians of the people’s history, such as Adam Leszczyński and Michał Rauszer. Among the literary phenomena discussed are the depiction of landed estates as an abstract homeland, portraying the territory as national due to its alleged cultural and historical value, and the use of the agrarian motif to symbolize the Polishness of natural elements. The motifs of “holding the land” in selected texts from 1874–1913 are presented as inextricably linked to the positivist postulate of grassroots work, leading to conclusions about the instrumental use of former serfs by the Polish national discourse.

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