Aleksander Wat: Life and Art of an IconoclastYale University Press, 1996 M01 1 - 369 pages Aleksander Wat was, in many ways, the archetypal Central European intellectual of the mid-twentieth century, a man who experienced and influenced all the tumultuous political and artistic movements of his time. Yet little has been published about him, even in his native Poland. This book is the first account of Wat's turbulent life, accompanied by a thorough analysis of his extraordinary poems and prose works in their diverse periods and genres. Tomas Venclova, himself a poet of international renown, has uncovered numerous new biographical details, made the surprising discovery of an unfinished novel Wat began fifty years ago, and woven together the themes of Wat's life and work. At different times a futurist, surrealist, and Communist fellow traveler, Wat turned away from communism after his imprisonment by the Soviet secret police and became a vociferous spokesman for democracy. Venclova tells Wat's story from his Polish-Jewish upbringing in the early 1900s, his participation in the literary avant-garde in the 1920s, and his work as editor of an influential Communist journal before World War II through his emigration to the West in 1959 and his death in 1967. Venclova argues convincingly that Wat's literary achievement promoted the rejuvenation of Polish and East European letters after the Stalinist era. His broad intellectual influence on many, including Czeslaw Milosz, helped to consolidate the moral and political opposition to totalitarian ideology that has profoundly changed political realities in the late twentieth century. |
Contents
Two Futurism 19191924 | 17 |
THREE Pug Iron Stove | 45 |
FOUR Radical Left 19241928 | 69 |
FIVE The Early Fiction | 84 |
SIX Communism 19281939 | 107 |
SEVEN Prison and Kazakhstan 19391946 | 130 |
EIGHT In Postwar Poland 19461957 | 158 |
An Attempt at Reconstruction | 183 |
TEN The New Poetics | 199 |
ELEVEN Emigration 19571967 | 236 |
TWELVE A Critique of Stalinist Reason | 254 |
The Poetry of Exile | 279 |
Notes | 309 |
347 | |
361 | |
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Aleksander Wat Aleksandra Wata Alma-Ata Andrzej appeared artistic became become Broniewski Century chap Communist critics culture Czerwony Sztandar Czesław Miłosz death dream Dziennik bez samogłosek early émigré essays exile experience fate futurist German Gnostic human Ibid intellectual Jasieński Jewish Kartki na wietrze Kazakhstan Kraków Kultura language later Literary Monthly literature Loth's Flight Lubyanka Lucifer Unemployed Lwów Marxist Mayakovsky means metaphor metaphysical metonymy Mój wiek Moralia Moscow motif myth najważniejsze narrator Nazi never nevertheless night NKVD novel Paris parody pattern perhaps period person philosophical Pigeon Street Pisma wybrane play poet poetic Poland Polish futurist political prison Przyboś published Pug Iron Stove reader Russian semantic Słonimski socialist realist song Soviet Stalin Stalinist Stanisław Stawar story symbolism tion totalitarian tradition translated Tuwim universe Warsaw Wat archive Wat wrote Wat's Wat's memoirs Wat's poem Watowa Ważyk Witkacy words writers young Young Poland