Russia an empire of the “form” in Cyprian Norwid’s writings

Abstract

The aim of the article is to analyse Norwid’s historiosophical reflections on Russia, in which the key role is played by metaphors based on the relationship between the “form” and the “content”. This metaphoricity is reflected in the popular motif in the poet’s works, which considered the relationships of the “word” – the “letter” and the “spirit” – the “body”. In the analysed fragments, mainly from the poem Niewola, tsarist, imperialist Russia appears as an empire of the “form”, which in this case is supposed to mean the dominance of formalism and broadly understood enslavement over the spiritual content. In Norwid’s eyes, Russia, similarly to imperial Rome, stands in a clear opposition to the spirit of freedom, nation or humanity. The poet’s vision reflects the popular trends in the 19^th-century literature.