How did Norwid see the role of the word in an uprising? (translated by Tadeusz Karłowicz)

Abstract

The article shows that in the centre of Norwid’s reflection on the January Uprising there was the problem of the word. It was just around the issue of the word that in fact all motifs concentrated that were significant for Norwid’s thought about the Uprising; the issue was a peculiar axis concentrating the poet’s views and deeds of that period

The word, to which Norwid so often referred, was not a poetic word. Norwid’s attention during the Uprising was focused on writing on political and social subjects, and especially on establishing a journal that would compensate for deficiencies of the press of that time that the poet regarded as being on a very low level. The planned newspaper’s first function was to provide the reader with reliable and impartial information, that – according to Norwid – is an ethical instrument; it leads to the truth, and ultimately to minimizing the need to shed blood. The newspaper’s propaganda role seemed to be the most distinctive aim. The impressive, persuasive dimension of influencing the reader by the word was not, however, in the poet’s interpretation limited to “conducting the readers’ opinions”, or sometimes even leading foreign recipients. The planned journal was to influence Russia in a special way. The fundamental aim, for which – in Norwid’s opinion – acts should be performed, acts which consisted in using the word, was connected with the issue of work and with the necessity to build a new Polish consciousness – or indeed, with restructuring the consciousness in such a way that the real place of Poland and Poles in Europe could be considered. The thesis about the need of “the work of thought” was closely connected with important motifs in Norwid’s thought: the integral concept of the man and of the nation, with the conviction about the key role of intelligence, and with the issue of “earliness” and recognition of kairos.