Czeslawo Miloszo „vabalų pasaulis"
The "insect-world" of Czeslaw Milosz

Summary/Abstract: This paper offers an interpretation of a problem omnipresent in the writings of Czesfaw Milosz: the relationship of faith and science in the modern world. The aim here is, nonetheless, a modest one; an attempt is made to view the larger issue of the confrontation between science and religion through an analysis of a single motif, namely the motif of insects in the poetry of Czesfaw Milosz. By choosing poems from different periods and written in different places ("The World", "Voices of Poor People", "Bobos Metamorphosis", "Diary of a Naturalist", "Spider"), this paper develops the theme of nature in two contradictory sets of meanings: nature as a source of enchantment or epiphany and, on the other hand, nature as a source of animal and human pain, a "senseless" process without a beginning or an end. These cwo aspects of the experience of nature can be called grace and despair. This thusly proceeds to the underlying theme of the analysis, from the "naive" or childish experience of paradise to a dark, Darwinian "inferno" of exiled pain. The tension between these two poles marks the entire poetry of Mifosz and introduces a Manichean split into his experi¬ence of himself, as well as his vision of the world.

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