Aktorowie początkowi
The Initial Actors

Summary/Abstract: The title of the article is borrowed from the incipit of the part of Myśli o pismach polskiech (‘Thoughts on Polish Written Works’) that Prince Adam Kazimierz Czartoryski devoted to the first actors of the National Theatre. Czartoryski mentions three names there: Świerzawski, Truskolawska (actually, Truskolaska), and Owsiński. This was the first generation of Polish dramatic actors who performed on the Warsaw stage in the 1765–1775 decade, which is the period concurrent with successes of the greatest stars of European stages: Eckhof in Germany, Garrick in England, and Lekain in France. They were the performers who in the mid-eighteenth century consistently strived at achieving a greater depth of stage acting, which included perfecting the style of declamation characteristic for the “French school.” Adam Kazimierz Czartoryski as a co-founder of the National Theatre along with the Warsaw cultural elite of the period (e.g. Emanuel Murray), who watched their performances during their voyages abroad, considered this style of acting to be exemplary and advised the Polish actors to imitate it. Contemporary research on the style of play of the three “initial actors” does indeed make it possible to recognise in their creations characteristics of the “French school,” advised by “men of taste,” the characteristics that started fading away as the second generation of the National Theatre actors came to the fore at the beginning of the 19th century.

• Details
• Contents