Poszukiwacz sensu wśród strzępków historii. Wokół „Z. Po-wieści” Mieczysława Porębskiego
A Seeker of Sense Among the Shreds of History

Author(s): Katarzyna Szkaradnik
Subject(s): History, Philosophy, Language and Literature Studies, History of ideas, Polish Literature, Hermeneutics
Published by: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Śląskiego
Keywords: Mieczysław Porębski; hermeneutics; philosophy of history; philosophy of culture; historical novel; autobiography
Summary/Abstract: The book is devoted to the reconstruction and analysis of the philosophy of history and philosophy of culture, an outline of which Mieczysław Porębski presented in Z. Po-wieść (1989). This work is sometimes classified as a postmodern “professorial novel”, while the author of A seeker of sense among the strands of history tries to demonstate that the bricolage poetics is mainly staffage, as the distinguished art historian and theorist was motivated by the desire to reflect on the historical process and the meaning of European culture for contemporaries. The leitmotif of Z. is the wandering of the title character through the history and literature of the Old Continent, considered in the monograph i.a. in relation to the composition, the world presented, the autothematism, the philosophical assumptions and the ideological meaning of the novel. The authoress analyzes the figure of the protagonist, genological issues, the problem of historiography and narrative, and the textual implication of the authorial subject. She considers the dialectic between the search for universal truths about human nature and the imperative to convey the truth of one’s own time, and furthermore presents the futuristic predictions of the author of Iconosphere. Finally, she shows the hermeneutic perspective as the best one to interpret Z., as it is revealed in the actions and utterances of the protagonist himself, who seeks the essential message of tradition and the meaning of historical experience.

• Details
• Contents