Tematy i Konteksty 1(6) 2011

URI dla tej Kolekcjihttp://repozytorium.ur.edu.pl/handle/item/414

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Przeglądanie Tematy i Konteksty 1(6) 2011 według Autor "Dorosz, Beata"

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    Kazimierz Wierzyński w kręgu Polskiego Instytutu Naukowego
    (Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Rzeszowskiego, 2011) Dorosz, Beata
    The article presents an episode in the biography of Kazimierz Wierzyński related to the time of his emigration in the United States of America: since 1941 until his departure to Europe in 1959. Further contacts with the environment of Polish émigrés in New York, still kept after the poet’s return to Europe until his death in February 1969, are also taken into consideration in the article. However, the main point of reference is Wierzyński’s cooperation with the Polish Institute of Arts and Sciences in the United States (headquartered in New York). The Institute was formed in May 1942 as a branch of the Polish Academy of Learning in order to support unhampered artistic and scholarly development of Polish scientists and artists living in the USA during the wartime. Wierzyński was not only involved in activities of the Commission of Literary History of PIAS but had also been for many years a member of the Board of the Institute. Wierzyński, as well as the other prominent representatives of New York Polish émigrés like Jan Lechoń or Józef Wittlin, took part in numerous cultural and artistic events organized by PIAS or under its auspices. Discussing these events enables, on the one hand, individual analyses of Wierzyński’s works and their reception among both Polish and American readers (among others: English publications, translations and endeavours towards the Nobel Prize for the poet). On the other hand, observations of the émigrés’ society and its involvement in preserving and promoting Polish culture in exile can also be provided. In order to describe the role of Wierzyński as an independence activist the article recollects several facts related to the cooperation between PIAS and the National Committee for Free Europe. The main focus falls on the involvement of Polish poets, including Wierzyński, in a variety of programs of the Radio Free Europe, as well as on their participation in the organization of the Congress of Free Polish Culture that was to take place in Paris in 1956. Discussion related to the development of PIAS and its possible cooperation with academic institutions of the People's Republic of Poland is used in order to present Wierzyński’s attitude towards contacts of the émigrés with Poland. He was in favour of such contacts due to the strong conviction that any links with Western culture support his compatriots in their resistance to the communist regime and their struggle with the process of sovietization. The article quotes hitherto unknown documents as it is based on materials discovered mainly in Polish and American archives in the USA. Thus, the article is considered a contribution to the biography of Wierzyński, discussed not only from the perspective of literary and cultural context, but also historical, political and sociological point of view.