Unde malum? Czesław Miłosz on Fyodor Dostoyevsky and Vladimir Solovyov

Tekstualia ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 4 (67) ◽  
pp. 69-76
Author(s):  
Monika Wójciak
Keyword(s):  
World Literature ◽  
Fyodor Dostoyevsky ◽  
Czeslaw Milosz ◽  
Grand Inquisitor

This article discusses Czesław Miłosz’s essays on Grand Inquisitor by Fyodor Dostoyevsky and A Tale of the Anti-Christ by Vladimir Solovyov. These essays focus on the essence, genesis, and forms of evil, and seek an answer to the unde malum question. Miłosz believes that in world literature there are no other works that show the nature of evil in a similar way. Dostoyevsky’s work, when read from various philosophical perspectives, reveals very complex meanings, as Solovyov demonstrates. Through his engagement with the two great Russian writers, Miłosz’s own work resonates more strongly in the debate about the condition of the modern man.

From the gambler within: Dostoyevsky's The Gambler

2012 ◽  
Vol 18 (3) ◽  
pp. 226-231 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sanju George
Keyword(s):  
Mental Illness ◽  
19Th Century ◽  
World Literature ◽  
Fyodor Dostoyevsky ◽  
Gambling Addiction ◽  
Central Theme

SummaryFyodor Dostoyevsky is widely regarded as the greatest 19th-century Russian writer and a giant in world literature. He is familiar to literary-inclined psychiatrists for his rich and accurate portrayal of mental illness in several of his works. But his own chronic addiction to gambling and its consequent perils are less well-known. This article discusses The Gambler, one of Dostoyevsky's early (1866) semi-autobiographical novellas, inspired by his own addiction to roulette, focusing on its depiction of gambling. To better understand Dostoyevsky the gambler, the article also presents brief excerpts from letters that he wrote to his wife in 1867, when his gambling addiction appears to have been at its worst. Finally, the relevance of the central theme of this work, gambling addiction, to the present-day psychiatrist is discussed.

scholarly journals Polish Literature in Albanian

2019 ◽  
Vol 25 (2) ◽  
pp. 145-158
Author(s):  
Leonard Zissi
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
World Literature ◽  
Literary Work ◽  
Nobel Prize Winner ◽  
Witold Gombrowicz ◽  
Polish Literature ◽  
Czeslaw Milosz ◽  
Scientific Institutions ◽  
Polish Language ◽  
Quo Vadis

Albania is a small country in Europe, which was under Turkish occupation for nearly five centuries. It did not regain its independence until 28 November 1912. During the occupation there was almost no foreign literature translated into Albanian, as more than 85% of the population were illiterate and in general there were no scientific institutions or schools. The first primary school was opened in 1887. Only in the 1920s, with the emergence of intelligentsia, world literature started to be translated into Albanian, which included Polish literature. However, the translations were not done from the Polish language but from Italian translations of it. The first Polish literary work translated into Albanian from Italian was the Nobel prize winner Henryk Sienkiewicz’s novel, Quo Vadis? (in 1933). The book was translated for the second time in 1999. The translation of Polish literature into  Albanian gained momentum after World War II, and especially after 2000. So far, nearly 55 books by 34 Polish authors have been translated into  Albanian, including Adam Mickiewicz (among them his great work, Pan Tadeusz), Henryk Sienkiewicz, Boleslaw Prus, Czesław Miłosz, Wisława Szymborska, Olga Tokarczuk, Ryszard Kapuściński, Tadeusz Różewicz, Witold Gombrowicz, Fr. Marcin Czermiński, and  others. At the same time, 8 Albanian authors wrote books on Polish topics in Albanian. Apart from the Albanian translators from Albania, Polish literature has also been translated into Albanian by Albanians from Kosovo. In comparison with other European countries,  Albania is a leader as far as the number of Polish books translated is concerned. Polish literature in Albanian is generally popular among Albanian readers. Some of the books are published for the second, or even after the third time.

scholarly journals Od wartości humanistycznych do teologicznych. O odwołaniach do literatury pięknej w homiliach i przemówieniach Jana Pawła II

2020 ◽  
Vol 68 (1 Zeszyt specjalny) ◽  
pp. 405-419
Author(s):  
Anastazja Seul
Keyword(s):  
World Literature ◽  
Fyodor Dostoyevsky ◽  
Rabindranath Tagore ◽  
Special Place ◽  
Theological Virtues ◽  
Belles Lettres

The author of this article shows two types of values that are present in those pronouncements when the Pope recalls examples from belles-lettres. First and foremost, he speaks of the humanistic values rooted in the philosophy of the essence, namely the truth, goodness and beauty that are widely found in works of both less and more well-known authors of different nations. The aforementioned values, having a transcendent backdrop, open up the theological world. Some of those references unveil the three theological virtues which actually represent Christian axiology. For the Pope, the belles-lettres works become locus theologicus. In his pronouncements, the Pope not only mentions various authors from the particular nations he visited (e.g. Rabindranath Tagore from India, Jon Svensson from Island), but also those authors whose works now belong to the whole world (such as Fyodor Dostoyevsky, mentioned in Australia, or St. Augustine in France and Brazil). Recalling those authors and their works, the Pope connected with those nations he visited, and created a special place in order to bring to those nations the greatest works of world literature. He was adamant that humanistic and theological values can be placed equally next to each other.

When He would Compose from Fragments a World Perfect at Last: Theology and Poetics in Czeslaw Milosz's "From the Rising of the Sun"

2005 ◽  
Vol 9 (3-4) ◽  
pp. 284-312
Author(s):  
David Stankiewicz
Keyword(s):  
World Literature ◽  
Full Range ◽  
Nobel Laureate ◽  
Being And Time ◽  
Natural Order ◽  
The Sun ◽  
Long Poem ◽  
Czeslaw Milosz ◽  
Contemporary World ◽  
Theological Thought

AbstractThis essay considers the place of religious and theological thought in the work of 20th century Nobel Laureate, Czeslaw Milosz (1911–2004). In a manner unique in contemporary world literature, Milosz approached and utilized these realms as a means to formulate and examine questions that are both timely and timeless. Focusing on sections I, II, and VII of the long poem-sequence, "From the Rising of the Sun," (along with discussions of other key poems and texts) the essay explores the dynamic interplay between theological thought and poetic craft in Milosz's work. Section I, "The Unveiling," introduces both the key themes the poem sequence explores (being and time, the meaning of history and individual lives, fall and redemption) as well as key poetic techniques (direct descriptive invocation and nuanced use of verb tense). Section II functions as a poetic embodiment of a particularly Miloszian, unorthodox "Manichaenism," an outlook that finds no basis for human values in the natural order of the world. Embedded in this section is a poetic gesture of hope that is more fully explored in Section VII. In this concluding section Milosz, using a full-range of poetic techniques ranging from the dramatic-narrative to the direct invocation of vanished reality, explores the heterodox theological concept of apokatastasis, or total restoration, as a gesture of profound hope that has theological, ethical, and aesthetic implications.

scholarly journals PRECEDENTIAL INTERTEXT IN THE POEM “THE GRAND INQUISITOR”

2021 ◽  
Vol 19 (2) ◽  
pp. 125-140
Author(s):  
Irina Dergacheva
Keyword(s):  
World Literature ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Eternal Truths ◽  
Black Rhetoric ◽  
The New Testament ◽  
Grand Inquisitor ◽  
Brothers Karamazov ◽  
Correct Understanding ◽  
Spiritual Freedom ◽  
Good And Evil

The poem "The Grand Inquisitor" is part of the novel "The Brothers Karamazov," written by Ivan Karamazov about Christian freedom of will and told by him to his brother Alyosha, who rightly perceived it as an Orthodox theodicy. The article presents an intertextual analysis of the precedent texts used by F. M. Dostoevsky in the poem "The Grand Inquisitor". In particular, the meanings of direct quotations from the New Testament, especially its last book, the Revelation of John the Theologian, and the translated apocrypha "The Walking of the Virgin in Torment" are interpreted; medieval Western European mysteries in the paraphrase of V. Hugo; poetic quotations from the works of A. S. Pushkin, V. A. Zhukovsky, F. I. Tyutchev, which linked together the axiological concepts of the narrative text. Appeals to the precedent texts of world literature contribute to the disclosure of the multifaceted symbolism of the poem, which glorifies the spiritual freedom of humanity as an act of faith, and help to generalize and deepen its axiological discourse. The author analyzes the speech and behavioral tactics of the Grand Inquisitor, based on the substitution of concepts characteristic of the techniques of "black rhetoric". In contrast to the Grand Inquisitor's distortion of cause-and-effect relations and the concepts of good and evil, and his denial of the idea of Christian freedom, direct and indirect quoting of texts that have become part of the heritage of world culture creates a text rich in axiological meanings, designed to influence the spiritual space of the reader, enriching it and orienting it to the correct understanding of eternal truths.

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