Concept sphere of "Young Poland" free verse writing in critical and artistic dimensions

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CONCEPT SPHERE OF `YOUNG POLAND' FREE VERSE WRITING IN CRITICAL AND ARTISTIC DIMENSIONS

Naumenko N.V.

National University of Food Technologies

The article gives a synesthetical analysis of several poems taken from `Young Poland' (`Mloda Polska') period, considering its critical interpretations during the 20^th - the beginning of the 21^st cemtury. Studying Lesya's survey of the `Young Poland 'poetry has conditioned the subject of this research, which is such insufficiently explored field as free verse writing. The nature of free verse would allow determining the specifications of generic and stylistic diffusion in works of a certain poet and observe formation of an individual vision of the world thereby reflected in re-interpreted initials of folklore verse. Taking impressionism, which is believed to be the common stylistic marker for `Young Poland' lyrics, into consideration can evoke the researcher's interest to vers libre as one of its characteristic phenomena.

There was shown that the conceits of `Young Poles 'creativity, the choice of genre and versification order first, evidence the writers' return to initial artistic syncretism. Particularly, free verse, upon combining the prosodic systems dominant in different periods of literary process, appears to be the successor of preliminary versification traditions and, at the same time, the founder of those new. The special imagery of free verse works is defined by various lexical massifs (exotic, colloquial, or dialect words), philosophical and scientific terms. Due to `Young Poles 'activity, the development of free verse was actualized at the end of the 19^th - the beginning of the 20^th century. Stylistic diversity of free verse works by Polish Modernist poets - in particular, the symbiosis of Neoromanticism, Symbolism, Impressionism, Expressionism, and Imagism - determined the experimental characteristics of their poetics, which are word making, onomatopoeias usage, artistic synthesis, tendency to exotic stanza patterns, and re-interpretations of classical literature images.

Key words: versification, Young Poland, free verse, artistic synthesis, image, motif, symbol, criticism.

Problem Statement. Transition periods in literature are contradictory and multi-vector phenomena. It was at the turn of the 19^th - 20^th centuries when the new literary trend, famous as `Young Poland,' emerged on the artistic map of the Eastern Europe. Apparently, it can properly epitomize the organic amalgamation of traditions of Polish Romanticism and French Symbolism.

Researches on the specifications of `Young Poland' poetry in Ukraine were at first done by Ivan Franko and Lesja Ukrajinka. To begin with, Franko's conversance in Polish literature was essentially large, which can be evidenced either by his early article “Pol's'kyj seljanyn v osvitlenni pol's'koji literatury” (A Polish Peasant as Highlighted by Polish Literature, 1887), paying tribute to the Positivist methods of research, or the integrated scientific reflections over Polish Modernism, particularly Romanticism, in the work “Poezija Jana Kasprowicza” (Poetry by Jan Kasprowicz, 1889) and some other treatises.

While I. Franko was trying to embrace as long array of events as possible, Lesja Ukrajinka narrowed her choices down to comparatively brief period - from the end of the 19^th to the beginning of the 20^th centuries. Her article “Zametki o novejshej pol'skoj literature” (The Notes on Nowadays Polish Literature, 1901) was intended to get the readers of that time acquainted with the peculiarities of Polish Modernist writs - firstly, the works by the representatives of `Young Poland' (`Mloda Polska') artistic movement.

What is the most noticeable about this article is that Lesja's critical manner tended towards the synthesis of `seriousness' and `eulogy,' because, as the writer herself explained, such criticism might have given an authoritative material for an insight into a nation's intellectual life, elucidating its strengths as well as weaknesses. That was why she wrote at the end of the article:

«Польская критика вслед за беллетристами взывает: «Синтеза, синтеза, во что бы то ни стало»! Но не лучше ли было бы заменить эти слова другими: «Свободы духа, отваги, во что бы то ни стало!» - быть может, это требование даже легче выполнить. Во всяком случае, этих элементов наиболее недостает богатой, разнообразной и крайне интересной польской литературе нашего времени, а это элементы, необходимые, между прочим, и для синтеза [5, c. 126].

The Neo-Romantic tendencies of Modernist Polish literature were what Lesja Ukrajinka particularly appreciated about it. As she thoroughly observed, Kazimierz Przerwa-Tetmajer, Zenon Przesmycki, Andrzej Nemojewski, Stefan Zeromski, Waclaw Sieroszewski and, what was the utmost, Stanislaw Przybyszewski they had all contributed to the development of national literature due to their original manner of writing and “extremely subjective attitudes” [1, c. 252].

Analysis of Recent Researches and Publications. Unfortunately, after Lesja Ukrainka's death, the researches of `Young Poland' poetry in Ukraine are still sporadic, which may be partially explained by Soviet ideological restrictions imposed on academic philology. For instance, poetry by Leopold Staff had been profoundly analyzed in monographs by Julija Bulakhovs'ka (1970) and Ellina Cykhovs'ka (2012) who both affirmed impressionism as his stylistic dominant.

The connections of `Young Poland' lyrics with Modernistic Ukrainian poetry were studied by Volodymyr Morenec' (“Nacional'ni sljakhy poetycnoho modernizmu I polovyny XX stolittja”, 2002) and overlapped by Mykola Il'nyc'ky (“Filosofija bronzovykh mjaziv: Bohdan-Ihor Antonyc i Kazimierz Wierzynski”, 2008). What the researchers remarked about the poetry of `Young Poland' was its tendency to “re-confirm the national authenticity of the Poles” [2, c. 721; 3, c. 81]. Both Morenec and Il'nyc'ky deduced that the 20^th century Polish poetry was developing in unison with Ukrainian one, which thesis would become the reason to set up a paradigm for comparative studies.

Thenceforth, the brief survey of existing inquiries of Polish literature helped the author of this article outline the certain trend for the further research, which is free verse writing. The nature of free verse, also known as vers libre, would allow determining the specifications of generic and stylistic diffusion in works of a certain poet and observe formation of an individual vision of the world thereby reflected in re-interpreted initials of ancient verse, Biblical first of all. Taking impressionism, which is believed to be the common stylistic marker for `Young Poland' lyrics, into account would lead any researcher to the conclusion about vers libre as one of its intrinsic stylistic constituents.

The Objectives of the Article. Therefore, the objectives of this work are to establish the formal and substantial features of free verse writing in Polish Modernism by juxtaposition of Young Poland's vers libres belonging to different authors (Waclaw Rolicz- Lieder, Tadeusz Micinski and Bronislawa Ostrowska), regarding the critical views of Polish literature of that time and its interpretations in Ukrainian science.

Results and Discussions. According to the esthetical program of `Young Poland,' a writer was proclaimed an exile from utility world and thereinafter declared “a Lord of the Lords”, in other words - a herald of transcendences, unlike a mediocre `civilized man' who had desperately lost one's connections with Nature. Obviously, free verse at that time was widely lauded as a hypothetic variety of a specific `prophetic' manner of speech.

Commenting upon vers libre, which is frequently named a `wiersz wolny wspolczezny' (i. e. contemporary) in Polish literary dictionaries, Maria Dluska in her monograph “Proba teorii wiersza polskiego” (An Attempt to Theorize over the Polish Verse, 1962) gave it a definition `wiersz zdaniowy' (which can be translated as `the verse of sentences'), stressing its intonation-syntactic initials. As for her, “...nowoczcsny nasz wiersz intonacijno-zdaniowy <...> pojawil siq pod koniec XIX w. pod wplywami zachodniego vers-libre'u <...> Nasz nowy wiersz zdaniowy ma za sobq [...] cala wysoko rozwiniqtq praktykq sylabicznq naszej poezji, praktykq sylabotonizmu, a w dodatku rozwija siq obok systemu toniczniego” [6, c. 245-246].

In other words, free verse as a synthesis of different versification systems to be dominant in a certain period may be considered to continue the precedent verse traditions and meantime to establish the new ones. This is why the free-verse writers willingly use the specific imagery (including various massifs of passive lexica such as exotic and borrowed words, vulgarisms and dialectal means), philosophical notions or scientific terms, thereby composing their poems as reflections over arts.

The noticed variation has been found in lyrics by Waclaw Rolicz-Lieder. Firstly, “Uruguay”, a lyroepic poem with elements of ostrannenije (this untranslatable term was implemented by Victor Sklovskij to signify a narrator's look at a real thing as if seen at first time), is alleged to be the pure sample of Biblical-styled or, in addition, Whitmanian free verse:

Przybywajqc z australskich brzegow, zwalczywszy burz kilkoro i zataczajqc sie po drodze jakpijany wyrobnik, otarl siq wreszcie sliskimi bokami o wyznaczone molo - i stanal.

Z dwoch cylindrow kanarkowej barwy wydrgal ostatek siwawego dymu, ktory okopcal gwiazdy oceanu, a wewnqtrz nikt nie czeka gadziny przybicia, zadna kobieta w omdleniu duszy nie wydaje [...] [10, c. 38]

The plot of the poem is focused on the arrival of an Australian steamboat to the South American shores, shown through the `viewpoint' of a vessel itself. Thanks to the exotic words woven into practically prosaic lines, the speaker succeeded in creating the special Neo-romantic dwarfism where the smoke-stacks, euphonically named `the canary-yellow cylinders' (cylindry kanarkowej barwy) make a contract with colorless `fishy eyes of the cabins' (oczy... sq bez wyrazu, wpologlupiale, wpolzmqczone), and the marine air is opposed to the `breath of ailment' emanated by passengers.

What would force us to conclude about the priority of Rolicz-Lieder's “Uruguay” in Polish Modernistic free-verse writing is mainly the conceit of an endless travel imminently finishing in Non-Being (in the Hell - `pieklo portowe' for Rolicz-Lieder). Besides, the Polish poet in his prose-oriented lines (sometimes called `versets') descended to the visions of people doing their chores at the ship (seamen washing floors, a captain uttering the orders, a cook woman peeling potatoes) after a return from overseas, in which narration the romantic marine adventures should be present latently.

Thanks to alternation of motifs, specific intonation and reiterations, it is possible to determine the symbol of a steamboat created by the Polish poet as the analogue of Noah's Ark or A. Rimbaud's `Le Bateau Ivre':

Lampy kolorowe blysnqly na statkach; bliskim jest czas wieczerzy dla szorujqcych kajuty: wokolgwar przyspieszony, wokol slychac szuranie szczotek ryzowych, pluskanie wody zbieranej scierkami [10, c. 39].

In essence, W. Rolicz-Lieder's verses, adorned with internal rhymes, alliterations and assonances, can be related to the emotional phenomena talked about in Boleslaw Lesmian's essay “Rytm jako swiatopoglqd” (The Rhythm as the Worldview): “Rytm w poezii stanowi pierwiastek upojen, oszolomien i uczuciowych, nielogicznych nakazow (underlining is mine - NN), ktorym sie posluszne oddzielne slowa” [7, c. 66].

The highlighted emotional traits of free verse such as exaltation (upojennia), stupefaction (oszolomiennia) and sensual illogical ordinances (uczuciowi nielogiczni nakazy), can be observed in works by another `Young Poland' poet, Tadeusz Micinski, collected in the only published book in his lifetime, “W mroku gwiazd” (In the Gloom of Stars, 1902). Particularly, the `prayer' intonation, hypothetically characteristic for free verse as a whole, determined the generic traits of the following poem, “Stygmaty sw. Franciska” (St. Francis's Stigmas):

O, wzgardz mnq, Panie, bom niegodny Ciebie - lecz w piersi mojej slyszq harfy granie i rqce moje wyciqgam w zaranie - ku Tobie.

Uderza na mnie blask Mocy i Tronow - gwiazdy mi grajq wsrod wieczornych dzwonow - na niebie krwawe blyskajqpurpury - Twoich tajemnic otchlanie i gory... [8, c. 65].

The intricate sequences of internal rhymes (such as Ciebie - na niebie, granie - zaranie, tronow - dzwonow, purpury - gory), as well as the metric structure of the lyrical narration, bearing the resemblance to either a clerical chant or an epic hexameter, would allow a reader to conceive the image of St. Francis of Assisi - the legendary Roman Catholic saint who was famous of the ability to understand the language of birds and was therefore closer to merge with the initial Nature and to restore the paradisiacal harmony.

Due to the free-verse writing of Boleslaw Lesmian, the `Young Poland' poetry had its own version of Francis's “The Praise to Creation”:

Pochwalony bqdz, Panie, przez brata naszego, ksiqzyc, i nasze siostry, gwiazdy,

Tys uksztaltowal je w niebie jasne i cenne, i piqkne. Pochwalone bqdz, Panie, przez brata naszego, wiatr, I przez powietrze, i czas pochmurny, i pogodny, i wszelki... [See 7, c. 422].

On top of that, the speaker turns to each object of his environment as if they are the live entities, or his brothers and sisters, in other words - treating them all as mediums on his way to God. Thanks to the specifications of poetic language that can “combine any discords, eliminate any oppositions and shift any perspectives” [9, c. 133], the reader can perceive the cosmogony act reflected in Francis's prayer as simultaneously creation and re-creation of Nature within the human soul.

That is why Francis's speech in Micinski's verse is pervaded with the similes and metaphors ornithological in style, say `the black-feathered depth' (glqb czarnopiora), or `the birds soaring in height' as souls of the dead asking about their fates. Overall, the extraordinarily powerful (it would be no exaggeration to say `cathartic') impact of the poem is assumingly conditioned by the weird alterations of sensory motifs (smells, colors, shadows and penumbras).

Upon turning back to lyrics by Waclaw Rolicz-Lieder, for instance, we can see that he embodied the prayer intonations in his archetypal turning to Muse in the following verse. Taking into consideration the specifications of Polish phonetics (exclusively a penultimate syllable to be stressed), the poem, formally the sonnet, tends toward the vers libre due to the absence of end-rhymes and sharply syncopated intonation:

Wiem! niewolnicq jestes, Muzo jasna,

Zywotem miejskim i troskq spqtana!

A swiat tak wielki i wiele na swiecie

Ludzi pieszczqcych kaprys slodkiej woli.

Chcialabys z zrodel pijac pirenejskich,

Katullusowe calowac jezioro

I, o kolumnq wsparta pompejanskq,

Chcialabys dmuchac w Wezuwiusza dymy.

Upita woniq cytryn i pomarancz,

Chcialabys plynqc do brzegow arabskich,

Gdzie monotonnosc gra gamq wieczystq.

I, ponad grobem Ewy zadumana,

Chcialabys widziec dworek modrzewiowy

Zdwojgiem wpatrzonych na gosciniec topol [11].

Here the speaker outlined the roles of both himself and the Muse - in particular, he initially called her `the captive' (niewolnicq), and from thence, using the verbs in conditional mood, led her through South European landscapes up to Eden, which, according to the speaker, may be re-found only with her help. That is why the poem is whelmed with sensory images, mostly olfactory (lemons, oranges, fumes of Vesuvius), to create the sensual paradisiacal atmosphere.

The similar game of sensory conceits is especially characteristic to the lyrics by female representatives of `Young Poland'. This can be denoted by the works of Bronislawa Ostrowska, which have acquired quite a metaphorical description in literary critical essays ofthe beginning ofthe 20^th century: “Ton skrzypcowy... siq panowac w lirykach p. Ostrowskiej, ton rzewny i rozwiewny, zaprzepaszczajqcy siq chqtnie wsrod kwiatow, gqstwy drzewnej, nad brzegami morz, w sitowiach rzecznych lub we mgle marzen, sloncem ozloconych. A ponad tym wszystkim czuwa swiatlosc niezlomnego artyzmu [7, c. 349].

To prove our point of view, we should exemplify it by Ostrowska's free-verse meditative poem “Nie! ne napiszq sonetu.” (No, I would not write a sonnet...), in which the secrets of poetic mastery are symbolized in natural, particularly floral images:

Nie! ne napiszq sonetu.

Ale narwq w ogrodzie astrow bialych,

Promienystych, lekkich komet o zlotym oku,

I galqzi bialodrzewy o bialym aksamicie skory na smutnych lisciach,

I welonow gipsowki drzqcych jak srebrna mgla -

I wlozq to w wysoki rzniqty krzystal na wnetrzu ciemnych drzwi.

[See 6, c. 246].

In the speaker's imagination, the composition of bouquets has been practically identified to the verse writing, which allows us to talk about the Japanese cultural concept `ikebana' creatively interpreted by Ostrowska. Poetry as an art appears to be conceived in a tuft of asters looking like the Milky Way, in sunflowers and mauves on the background of `laughter so loud,' in the grapes of rowan-tree, in spikes of wheat and rye, and even, so quaintly, in cracking hazelnuts. It is expedient to append that Ostrowska herself perceived poetry as “weaving the words in the soul like on the looms”. according to B. Lesmian's essay `Bronislawa Ostrowska: “Aniolom dzwiqku' [See 7, c. 322]; she considered it present in everything, and no specific words or, what is more, solid poetic forms (like sonnet, rondeau, triolet etc.) are needed to create it. Decidedly, the refrain “Nie! ne napiszq sonetu.” may epitomize this perception properly.

Therefore, we should confirm that Ostrowska's “Nie! ne napiszq sonetu.”, due to its free and meantime hexametrical form, acquired not only lyrical, but also epic features, having thus become specimens of a newly invented genre - a verse novella [4, c. 78-79].

Conclusions. In general, owing to the fact that the free verse was quite sporadic in early Polish Modernism, it appears to be the most remarkable phenomenon for such studies. What was found analogous in the single free-verse works by the different in style representatives of `Young Poland' such as Waclaw Rolicz-Lieder, Tadeusz Micinski and Bronislawa Ostrowska, was, firstly, the variations of long lines, sometimes called `versets'.

As the free verse at the end of the 19^th century was not differentiated from prose writing in terms of literary form, each of the poets analyzed preferred either to use lengthy end-stopped unrhymed lines or divide them into several verses with occasional rhymes - for instance, to create the intonation of listing (like in Micinski's “St. Francis's Stigmas”). Another factor to display the authors' aspiration to make their narrations sound epic was the three- foot meters (dactyl, amphibrach, and anapest) that imparted the Homeric resonance to the poems.

Furthermore, the formal factors discovered in the researched lyrical texts established the trend to outline their contextual similarity, which is selection of topics. Judging by the essence of plots and words to embody them, the free verses of `Young Poland' are profoundly philosophical, religious and reflective in content, but whenever the scenes of everyday life were depicted (by W. Rolicz-Lieder, for example), they would also become elements of contemporary archetypal picture of the world.

Finally, what conjugates the free verses of `Young Poland' in terms of literary form and sense is the splendiferous sensory (visual, auditory, tactile, olfactory) imagery. Particularly, the binary opposition `freedom / slavery', upon being topical for both countries in social and cultural aspects, has obtained its individual interpretations in the works by all of the poets investigated, with an archetype of Muse for the main symbol of liberated creativity.

Overall, the formal and substantial conceits ascertained in `Young Poland' free-verse heritage would surely evidence the writers' successful attempt to synthesize various versification systems and artistic means in embodiment of philosophically complicated as well as seemingly simple everyday themes, which became intrinsic to Modernistic literature of entire Europe.

free verse writing polish modernism young poland

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Науменко Н.В.

У статті з позицій синтезу мистецтв проаналізовано вільновіршову поезію періоду «Молодої Польщі» на тлі її критичних осмислень упродовж ХХ - початку ХХІ століть. Уважний погляд на формальні та змістові особливості молодопольської поезії зумовлює актуальність нашого дослідження - такий маловивчений аспект цього феномена, як вільне віршування. Природа верлібру дозволить визначити особливості взаємопроникнення жанрово-стильових рис у творчості певного автора і формуванні індивідуальної поетичної картини світу, заломлену крізь переосмислені фольклорні первини вільного вірша. Імпресіонізм, який, за свідченням переважної більшості науковців, є спільним стильовим знаменником лірики «МолодоїПольщі», спонукає дослідника звернути увагу на верлібр як одне з його характерних явищ.

Показано, що концепти творчості «молодополяків», передусім добір жанру твору та віршового ладу, засвідчують повернення авторів до первісного синкретизму мистецтв. Зокрема, верлібр як синтез панівних у різні періоди розвитку літератури систем віршування постає продовжувачем попередніх версифікаційних традицій і водночас започатковує нові. Саме це зумовлює особливу образність верлібрових творів, зокрема включення до їхньої мови різних лексичних масивів (екзотизмів, просторічних і діалектних слів), філософських понять, наукових термінів. Саме завдяки діяльності митців «МолодоїПольщі» в поезії кінця ХІХ- початку ХХ ст. актуалізувався розвиток вільного вірша. Стильова різнорідність творчості польських поетів доби модерну (зокрема, симбіоз неоромантизму з символізмом, імпресіонізмом, експресіонізмом, імажинізмом) породила нові варіації польського верлібру, визначила експериментаторський характер його поетики: словотворчість, звуконаслідування, синтез мистецтв, уживання екзотичної строфіки, переосмислення образів класичного письменства.

Ключові слова: віршування, «Молода Польща», верлібр, синтез мистецтв, образ, мотив, символ, критика.

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