Wincenty Lutosławski jako pisarz

Abstract

The author of this essay has dealt with the attitude towards literature of the outstanding Polish and European historian of philosophy and philosopher Wincenty Lutosławski (1863-1954). He became famous, among other things, for establishing the chronology of Plato’s works. As a young man, Lutosławski considered becoming a writer, but completed his studies in chemistry and philosophy in Dorpat. However, this did not dampen his passion for literature. The author puts forward a thesis that around 1900, after writing his most brilliant works in the history of philosophy, Lutosławski made an intellectual turn – he became a Neo -Messianist philosopher. Literature played an essential role in this process of transformation – Lutosławski reached for literary forms developed by Polish Romanticism (manifesto, book), for an aesthetics of sublimity, and irony, in order to use them to propagate Neo-Messianism. He left his mark on literature as an autobiographer, prose writer, essayist, literary critic, epistolographist and diarist.