Szpital żydowski w Warszawie
Jewish Hospital in Warsaw

Summary/Abstract: The presented edition of an unknown text (published in 1887 in “Izraelita”) by Maria Konopnicka attempts to reconstruct the meaning of the Jewish theme in Konopnicka’s worldview and writings, as well as to reconstruct a set of criteria for a possible dialogue between Jewish religion, culture, and worldview in Jewish Hospital in Warsaw. The author also regards the specific discourse in Konopnicka’s literary sketch in order to understand the use of many different intertextual microdimensions which comprise the motif of coexistence of life, disease and death as the main themes of the presented text. The reflections presented in the article focus on fundamental questions, namely the difficult dialogue of Jewish existence in 1887 Warsaw. In addition to sketching the meaning of being a Jew in 1887 Warsaw and describing various diseases present in Warsaw Jewish hospital, Konopnicka also presents the Jewishness as a disease (via Heinrich Heine) in Polish culture and self-perception in the second half of the nineteenth century.

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