CHAPTER XXI. — POLISH LITERATURE
At an Early Date Western Influence sufficiently Potent. Sixteenth Century Brilliant; Seventeenth and Eighteenth centuries highly Cultured; Nineteenth Century Notably Original.
WESTERN INFLUENCE—Widely different from Russian literature, much more Western, based more on Greek and Latin culture, Polish literature holds high rank in the histories of European literature. Christians from the tenth century, the Poles knew from this epoch religious songs written by monks, in the vulgar tongue. To this is due the possession of the Bogarodzica, a religious and bellicose song dedicated to the Virgin mother of God, which is even now comprehensible, so little has the Polish language changed. All through the Middle Ages, literary historians can only find chronicles written sometimes in Latin, sometimes in the native language. Under the influence of the universities, and also of the parliamentary rule, the language acquired alike more consistency and more authority in the fifteenth century, whilst the sixteenth was the golden literary epoch of the Poles. There were poets, and even great poets, as well as orators and historians. Such was Kochanowski, very much a Western, who lived some time in Italy, also seven years in France, and was a friend of Ronsard. His writings were epical, lyrical, tragical, satirical, and especially elegiacal. He is a classic in Poland. Grochowski left a volume of diversified poems, hymns on various texts of Thomas à Kempis, The Nights of Thorn, etc. Martin Bielski, who was an historian too, but in Latin, left two political satires on the condition of Poland, and his son Joachim wrote a history of his native land in Polish.
SEVENTEENTH AND EIGHTEENTH CENTURIES.—Though somewhat less brilliant than the preceding, the period of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries is not unfavourable to Poland. Then may be enumerated the satirical Opalinski, the lyrical Kochanowski, the dramatist Bogulawski, manager of the theatre at Warsaw, who not only translated plays from the French, English, and Spanish, but himself wrote several comedies, of which The Lover, Author, and Servant has remained the most celebrated. Rzewuski was a dramatic author with such national plays as Wladislas at Varna and Zolkewishi, and comedies as The Vexations and The Capricious, and he also was historian, orator, literary critic, and theorist.
Potocki was a literary and theoretical critic and founder of a sort of Polish academy (society for the perfection of the tongue and of style). Prince Czartoryski showed himself an excellent moralist in his Letters to Doswiadryski. Niemcewicz extended his great literary talent into a mass of diversified efforts. He wrote odes held in esteem, tragedies, comedies, fables, and tales, historical novels, and he translated the poems of Pope and the Athalie of Racine.
LITERARY RENAISSANCE.—Losing her national independence, Poland experienced a veritable literary renaissance, which offered but slender compensation. She applied herself to explore her origins, to regain the ancient spirit, and to live nationally in her literature. Hence her great works of patriotic erudition. Czacki with his Laws of Poland and of Lithuania, Kollontay with his Essay on the Heredity of the Throne of Poland, and his Letters of an Anonymous to Stanislas Malachowski, etc., Bentkowski with his History of Polish Literature and his Introduction to General Literature, etc. Thence came the revival of imaginative literature, Felinski, on the one hand translator of Crébillon, Delille and Alfieri on the other, he was the personally distinguished author of the drama Barbe Radzivill; Bernatowicz, author of highly remarkable historical novels, among which Poïata gives a picture of the triumph of Christianity in Lithuania in the fourteenth century; Karpinski, dramatist, author of Judith, a tragedy; Alcestis, an opera; Cens, a comedy, etc.; Mickiewicz, scholar, poet, and novelist, who, exiled from his own land, was professor of literature at Lausanne, then in Paris, at the College of France, extremely popular in France, Germany, Switzerland, and Italy, the friend of Goethe, Lamennais, Cousin, Michelet, and of all the French youth. He was the author of fine poems, of a great historical novel, Conrade Vattenrod, of The People and the Polish Pilgrims, of a Lesson on the Slav States.
MODERN EPOCH.—At the time of writing, Poland continues to be a literary nation well worthy of attention. She presents an example to the races which incur the risk of perishing as nations because of their political incapacity; by preserving their tongue and by sanctifying it with a worthy literature they guard their country and, like the Greeks and Italians, hope to reconquer it some day through the sudden turns of fortune shown in history.
INDEX OF NAMES CITED
About
Addison
Aeschines
Aeschylus
Aesop
Aicard
Alarcon
Alcasus
Alcamo, Ciullo of
Aleman
Alexander
Alfieri
Alphonso X
Alphonso XI
Alvarez
Ambrose, St.
Amyot
Anacreon
Anaxagoras
Andocides
Anne, Queen
Annunzio, Gabriel d'
Antiphon
Antonina
Antonius Diogenes
Apollonius
Appian
Apuleius
Aratus
Arcadius
Archilochus
Aretino
Ariosto
Aristophanes
Aristotle
Arnauld
Arrian
Asclepiades
Athanasius, St.
Attius
Aubigné, Agrippa d'
Augier
Augustine, St.
Augustus
Aulard
Aurispa
Ausonius
Avienus
B
Babrius
Bacon, Francis
Baldi
Balzac, G. de
Balzac, H. de
Bandello
Banville, T. de
Barnave
Barthari
Basil, S.
Bataille
Batiouchkov
Baudelaire
Bayle
Bazin
Beaumarchais
Beaumont
Beccaria
Belisarius
Bellay, Joachim du
Belleau
Bembo
Benserade
Bentkowski
Béranger
Bergerac, Cyrano de
Bergson
Bernard, Tristan
Bernardes
Bernatowicz
Berni
Bernstein
Bertaut
Bielski, Joachim
Bielski, Martin
Bion
Boccaccio
Bodmer
Boëtie, La
Bogulawski
Boileau
Bojardo
Bordeaux
Bordello
Bossuet
Bourdaloue
Bourget
Boutroux
Boylesve
Brantôme
Brieux
Brontë, C.
Brontë, E.
Browning, E. B.
Browning, Robert
Brueys, de
Brunetière
Brunetto
Buddha
Buffon
Bulwer-Lytton
Bunyan
Bürger
Burgundy, Duke of
Burns
Burton, Robert
Byron
C
Caballero
Caesar, Julius
Calderon
Callimachus
Callinos
Calvin
Caminha
Camoëns
Campistron
Campoamor
Candamo
Cañizares
Carducci
Carlyle
Caro
Cassini
Cassius
Castelar
Castro
Catherine of Russia
Cato
Catullus
Cellini, Benvenuto
Cephalon
Cervantes
Charles of Orleans
Charles II
Charles V
Chateaubriand
Chatterton
Chaucer
Chénier, André
Chénier, Marie-Joseph
Chrysippus
Chrysostom
Cicero
Claudian
Cleanthes
Coleridge
Comines
Commodian
Comnenus
Comte
Condillac
Congreve
Constant
Copernicus
Coppée
Corneille
Corte-Real
Cousin
Cowper
Crabbe
Cratinos
Crébillon
Cromwell
Cyprian, St.
Czacki
Czartoryski
D
Dancourt
Daniel (the abbot)
Daniel (the prisoner)
Dante
Danton
Daudet
Davenant
Davila
Defoe
Delavigne
Delille
Demosthenes
Descartes
Desportes
Destouches
Diamante
Dickens
Diderot
Dietmar
Diogenes
Dolce
Dostoevsky
Dryden
Duclos
Dufresny
Dumas, (père)
Dumas, (fils)
Dürer
E
Eberling
Echegaray
Eliot, George
Elisabeth
Ennius
Epictetus
Epicurus
Erasmus
Ercilla
Espinel
Espronceda
Eudoxia
Eupolis
Euripides
Eusebius
Eustathius
Evemerus
F
Falcam
Fayette, Mme. de la
Feijoo
Felinski
Fénelon
Ferreira
Fichte
Ficino
Fielding
Filangieri
Flaubert
Fletcher
Florez
Fogazzaro
Folengo
Fontenelle
Foscolo
Fouillée
Fox
Frederick II
Froissart
G
Galen
Galileo
Garnier
Gautier
Gellius Aulus
Gerson
Gibbon
Gilbert
Gil Vicente
Gioberti
Giordani
Goethe
Gogol
Goldoni
Goldsmith
Goncourt, de
Gongora
Gorgias
Gottsched
Gower
Gregory, St.
Gresset
Grimm
Grochowski
Grün
Guarini
Guasco
Guevara
Guicciardini
Guittone
Guizot
Gutierrez
Guyot
H
Habington
Haller
Haraucourt
Hartmann
Hauptmann
Haussonville, d'
Hecataeus of Abdera
Hegel
Heine
Heliodorus
Henry VI
Heraclitus
Herbert
Herder
Herodian
Herodotus
Herreros
Hervieu
Hesiod
Hilarion
Hilarius, St.
Hildebrand
Hippocrates
Homer
Horace
Huerta
Hugo, Victor
Hugo of Berzi
Hume
Hutten
Hyperides
I
Iffland
Isla
Isocrates
Ivan
Izoulet
J
Jacopone
James I
Jaurès
Jerome, St.
Jodelle
Johnson, Dr
Joinville
Jonson, Ben
Joseph of Byzantium
Jovellanos
Julian the Apostate
Junius
Justinian
Juvenal
Juvencus
K
Kalidas
Kant
Kantemir
Karpinski
Keats
Kempis, T. à
Klopstock
Kochanowski
Kollontay
Körner
Kotzebue
Krylov
Kürenberg
Kutochikine
L
Laberius
La Bruyère
Lacerda
La Chaussée
Lactantius
La Fontaine
Lamartine
Lamb, C
Lamennais
La Motte
Lanfranc
La Rochefoucauld
Lascaris
Lavater
Lavedan
Lavisse
Leconte de Lisle
Leibnitz
Lenau
Leonardo da Vinci
Leonidas
Leopardi
Lermontov
Le Sage
Lessing
Libanius
Livius
Livy
Lobo
Locke
Lomonosov
Longus
Lope de Vega
Lorris, William of
Louis, St
Louis XI
Lucena
Lucian
Lucilius
Lucretius
Luther
Lycophron
Lyly
Lysias
M
Mably
Macaulay
Machiavelli
MacPherson
Maffei
Mairet
Maistre, Joseph de
Malaspina
Malebranche
Malherbe
Mallarmé
Manuel, John
Manzinho
Manzoni
Marcus Aurelius
Marini
Marivaux
Marlowe
Marmontel
Marot
Martial
Martinez, Rose de la
Mary, Princess
Maynard
Medici, Catherine de'
Medici, Marie de'
Melanchthon
Meleager
Menander
Mendès
Mendoza
Mercier
Meredith
Mérimée
Metastasio
Meung, John de
Mezeray
Michelet
Mickiewicz
Milton
Mirabeau
Molière
Mommsen
Monomaque
Montaigne
Montalvo
Montchrestien
Montemayor
Montesquieu
Monti
Montluc
Moratin, Leandro
Moratin, Nicholas
Moschus
Mun, de
Musseus
Musset, A. de
N
Naevius
Napoleon
Nepos
Nerva
Newman
Newton
Nicole
Niebuhr
Niemcewicz
Nietzsche
Nonnus
O
Olivares
Opalinski
Oppian
Otway
Ovid
Ozerov
P
Pacuvius
Palaprat
Pandolfini
Pascal
Paulinus, St.
Paul I
Pellico
Pereira
Pericles
Perron
Perseus
Peter the Great
Petrarch
Petronius
Philetas
Philip III
Philostrates
Pico della Mirandola
Pindar
Piron
Pisistratus
Planudes
Plato
Platon
Plautus
Pliny the Elder
Pliny the Younger
Plutarch
Politien
Polybius
Pompignan
Pomponius
Pontus
Pope
Porto-Riche
Potocki
Prévost, Abbé
Prévost, Marcel.
Procopius
Propertius
Protagoras
Prudentius
Ptolemy
Publius Syrus
Pulci
Pushkin
Q
Quevedo
Quinet
Quintana
Quintilian
Quintus
Quintus Curtius
R
Rabelais
Racan
Racine
Radistchef
Raynal
Regnard
Régnier, H. de
Régnier, M.
Renan
Retz, Cardinal de
Ribeiro
Ribot, A.
Ribot, T.
Richardson
Richepin
Rivas
Robert
Robertson
Robespierre
Rojas
Ronsard
Rosa
Rosa, Salvator
Rossetti, Christina
Rossetti, Dante
Rostand
Roucher
Rouget de Lisle
Rousseau, J. B.
Rousseau, J. J.
Ruskin
Rutilius
Rzewuski
S
Saa de Miranda
Saa e Menezès
Saavedra
Saint-Amant
Saint-Évremond
Saint-Gelais
Saint-Lambert
Saint-Pierre, Bernardin de
Saint-Simon
Sainte-Beuve
Sakyamuni
Sallust
Sand, George
San Phillipo
Sannazaro
Sappho
Sardou
Savonarola
Scarron
Scève, Maurice
Schiller
Schopenhauer
Scipio
Scott
Scribe
Scudéry
Sédaine
Segrais
Seignobos
Sénancour
Seneca the Philosopher
Seneca the Tragic
Serao
Sévigné
Sextus Empiricus
Shakespeare
Shelley
Sheridan
Sidney
Silius Italicus
Simonides
Socrates
Solis
Sophocles
Soumarokoff
Southey
Spenser
Staël, Mme. de
Statius
Stendhal
Sterne
Sudermann
Sully-Prudhomme
Swift
Swinburne
T
Tacitus
Taine
Tannhäuser
Tansillo
Tasso
Tassoni
Tennyson
Terence
Tertullian
Thackeray
Thales
Theocritus
Theodora
Theophrastus
Thespis
Thibaut
Thierry
Thiers
Thomson
Thorn
Thucydides
Tibullus
Tiraboschi
Tirso de Molina
Tolstoy
Torricelli
Trajan
Trediakowski
Treitschke
Trueba
Turgenev
Turgot
Tyrtaeus
U
Urfé, Honoré d'
V
Vair, du
Valerius Flaccus
Valmiki
Varro
Vaugelas
Ventura de la Vega
Vergniaud
Verlaine
Vian, Theophilus de
Vico
Vignes, Peter of
Vigny, Alfred de
Villehardouin
Villon
Vinogradsky
Virgil
Vizin, von
Voiture
Voltaire
W
Waller
Wieland
Wolff
Wordsworth
Wycherley
X
Xenophon
Y
Young
Z
Zamora
Zedlitz
Zeno
Ziorgi
Zola
Zorilla
Zwingli