'What Does Poland Want from Me?' Male Hysteria in Andrzej Wajda's War Trilogy (original) (raw)

2016, The Cinematic Bodies in Eastern Europe and Russia

I n one of his public lectures, Andrzej Wajda complained that Polish literature lacks interesting female characters such as Emma Bovary. According to him, this absence was partly to blame for the historic and endemic parochialism of Polish culture. 1 Regardless of the accuracy of Wajda's critical statement, his choice of Flaubert's heroine as an example of complex femininity is certainly worth consideration. Why does he find her so attractive? Perhaps it is because Emma Bovary is such a departure from the historically dominant Polish model of a femininity that should cherish both national and familial values. Indeed, self-absorbed female hysterics are a rarity in Polish literature. The few who do exist, such as the character of Emilia Korczyńska from the novel Nad Niemnem (On the Banks of Niemen River, 1888) by Eliza Orzeszkowa, serve as objects of derision. The relative rarity of female hysteria does not imply that Polish culture is a domain of mental and emotional stability. In fact the very opposite is the case, as it contains an abundance of images of male madness. The figure of the Romantic 'mad patriot', as discussed by Maria Janion in her pioneering study, is the most familiar example (Janion 1989: 10-12). As Janion mentions, Adam Mickiewicz, the most prominent poet of vernacular Romanticism, noted in one of his Parisian lectures that the turbulent history of Poland may have adversely affected the people's mental state. Mickiewicz claimed that when Poland lost its independence in the eighteenth century, the Poles may have consequently lost their senses. Janion discusses numerous examples of both literary and historical figures 2 that settle Mickiewicz's idea on a more empirical base (Janion 1989: 11). In the twentieth century, Polish culture remained within the Romantic paradigm, along with the archetypal figure of the 'mad patriot', which have deeply affected the Polish discourse of masculinity. The films of Andrzej Wajda are frequently considered to exist within the paradigm of Romanticism (see e.g. Jackiewicz 1961; Lubelski 2000; Lubelski chapter 1