Światła widnokręgu. Mickiewicz i Oświecenie

Abstract

The author of the essay describes the problem of attitude of Adam Mickiewicz (1798–1855), the greatest Polish poet, a messianian, to the heritage of the Enlightenment. He notices in contemporary readings a tendency to writing the poet’s thoughts into a construction which he calls an “ideological hyper‑context”. By showing the writer’s contradictions, the hyper‑context is to bring out what is close to contemporary scholars, their ideological formation. Therefore the writer is fitted into hyper‑contexts such as: modernity, post‑modernity, modernization, Europeanness, secularity. Meanwhile – what is full contradiction – Mickiewicz’s thought explodes the ideological constructions built around it. It is neither anachronistic nor modern. It is peculiar and original.