Apollo Korzeniowski
Encyclopedia
Apollo Korzeniowski was a Polish
poet, playwright, clandestine political activist, and father of Polish-English novelist Joseph Conrad
.
village of Honoratka, then in Jampol County in what is now Vinnytsia Oblast
, Ukraine
. He was the son of Teodor Korzeniowski, an 1831 Polish Army captain, an impoverished nobleman who made a living running leaseholds, and Julia née
Dyakiewicz.
After graduating from secondary school
in Żytomierz, Apollo studied law and Oriental studies at the University of St. Petersburg, then returned to Ukraine, where in 1852 he became an estate manager in the Podole
village of Łuczyniec.
In 1854, during the Crimean War
, Apollo took an active part in preparations to organize in Ukraine
—in the rears of the Russian armies fighting in Crimea
—a Polish uprising. It came to nought due to British and French reluctance to get involved in the Polish cause.
In April 1856, Apollo married Ewelina Bobrowska, sister of Tadeusz Bobrowski and Stefan Bobrowski. Together with his mother-in-law, Apollo leased the village of Derebczynka. On December 3, 1857, the Korzeniowskis welcomed into the world their only child, Józef Teodor Konrad, the future English-language novelist Joseph Conrad
.
In early 1859, after losing all their fortune on the leasehold, the Korzeniowskis moved permanently to Żytomierz, where Apollo for a time served as secretary of a bookselling and publishing association and became a member of the board of directors of a Polish theater.
It was Korzeniowski's years at Łuczyniec, Derebczynka and Żytomierz that saw the greatest flowering of his literary creativity. His first substantial work was a manuscript cycle of religious-patriotic poems, Purgatorial Songs (Czyśćcowe pieśni, 1849–54), which came into being under the clear—and none too fortunate—influence of Zygmunt Krasiński
's poetry. Apollo overcame this influence only in the final poem of the cycle, "Forethunder" ("Przedgrom"), into which his earlier preparations for the unrealized uprising introduced revolution
ary accents. These accents also appeared in a manuscript cycle of poems written in 1855 at the news of the Tsarist Army's bloody suppression of a peasant revolt in Skvira County.
In 1854 Korzeniowski wrote his chef d'oeuvre, the drama Komedia (Comedy), its beginning parts modeled after Aleksandr Griboyedov's comedy, Gorie ot uma (Woe from Wit
). In Comedy, Korzeniowski severely criticized the Polish nobility in Ukraine and opposed it to two positive heroes—Henryk, a revolutionary-conspirator, and the Secretary, a cowed plebeian who, as the action develops, rebels against his employer. The play's 1855 publication (together with a lyric cycle, Stray Strophe
s—Strofy oderwane) became a social scandal. Little wonder that Comedy, severely treated by the critics, could not get onto the stage.
In 1858 Korzeniowski published a second drama, For a Pretty Penny (Dla miłego grosza), which was to some extent a continuation of Comedy. The new play likewise contained criticism of the wealthy Polish nobility in Ukraine, which was passing over to new, capitalist
methods of management; this time, however, the criticized milieu
was contrasted only with an old nobleman-conservative who desperately clung to the feudal system.
Apart from original work, Korzeniowski did translation
s, including Alfred de Vigny
's 1835 drama Chatterton and several works by Victor Hugo
: Hernani
, Marion Delorme
and fragments of La Légende des siècles. He also wrote much correspondence to the Warsaw
newspapers.
At the turn of the 1850s and 1860s, Korzeniowski once again engaged in socio-political activity. Thus, in April 1861 he took part, at Żytomierz, in deliberations by delegates of the nobility from the three guberniya
s comprising Rus Province—deliberations whose aim was the creation, with the help of the guberniya Agricultural Associations, of a common Polish organization for the Rus and Lithuanian provinces; Korzeniowski proposed then sending the Tsar
a demand to join the two provinces administratively to the Congress Poland
.
In May 1861, hearing of a patriotic movement developing in Warsaw
, Korzeniowski traveled from Żytomierz to Warsaw. There he sought the right to publish a radical socio-literary Biweekly (Dwutygodnik). Initially he associated himself with K. Majewski, who would later name him in testimony as his deputy in a "triumvirate
." Korzeniowski, however, distanced himself from Majewski due to the latter's contacts with the "Whites" and became close to more radical groups, especially to youth in the Academy of Fine Arts (Akademia Sztuk Pięknych) and to the "Red" representative, Ignacy Chmieleński, who would become the chief of the National Government (Rząd Narodowy) during the January 1863 Uprising
.
Korzeniowski became a leading organizer of political demonstrations. He helped organize celebrations of the anniversary of the Union of Lublin
, was an organizer of a demonstration connected with the funeral of Archbishop
A. Fijałkowski, and was the chief initiator of celebrations of the anniversary of the Union of Horodło. He also worked to organize a boycott
of municipal elections that were scheduled to begin in Warsaw on September 23, 1861.
When this effort failed and martial law
was declared in the Congress Poland
, Korzeniowski was one of the chief initiators in forming (October 17, 1861) a Municipal Committee (Komitet Miejski)—the supreme authority of the "Red" conspiracy.
On the night of October 20–21, 1861, Korzeniowski was arrested and placed in the infamous Tenth Pavilion of the Warsaw Citadel
. In May 1862 he was sentenced by a court martial to exile in Vologda
; a year later, this was commuted to Chernigov.
In exile, Korzeniowski resumed his literary work. He produced a memoir on "Poland and Moscow" ("Polska i Moskwa," published in a periodical in 1864); a fragment of a play, No Rescue (Bez ratunku); and a "Study of Drama in the Works of Shakespeare" ("Studia nad dramatycznością w utworach Szekspira"). He also translated Charles Dickens
' Hard Times
and Shakespeare's Comedy of Errors
.
At Chernigov, in 1865, Korzeniowski's wife Ewelina died of tuberculosis
. In late 1867, Korzeniowski himself, on account of his poor health (tuberculosis and heart disease
), was released from exile and allowed to leave Russia. In early 1868 he went with his son Konrad to Lviv
, in Austria
n-occupied Poland. A year later they moved to Kraków
, likewise in Austrian Poland, where Apollo could work with the recently founded democratic daily, Kraj (Homeland).
On May 23, 1869, Korzeniowski died in Kraków. He was interred in the Rakowicki Cemetery
. Over his grave stands a monument designed by sculptor Walery Gadomski.
. It was only with the astonishing world premiere of Apollo's Comedy in Wrocław in 1952, nearly a century after it had been written in 1854, that attention was brought to Apollo Korzeniowski as an important literary personality and man of action in his own right.
Approximately two weeks before his death Korzeniowski supervised the burning of all the manuscripts of his own work that he had in his possession. His son recalled: "I happened to go into his room a little earlier than usual that evening, and remaining unnoticed stayed to watch the nursing-sister feeding the blaze in the fire-place." However, a few manuscripts and a series of letters written before and during his exile to his most intimate friends survived in the possession of others.
Poland
Poland , officially the Republic of Poland , is a country in Central Europe bordered by Germany to the west; the Czech Republic and Slovakia to the south; Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania to the east; and the Baltic Sea and Kaliningrad Oblast, a Russian exclave, to the north...
poet, playwright, clandestine political activist, and father of Polish-English novelist Joseph Conrad
Joseph Conrad
Joseph Conrad was a Polish-born English novelist.Conrad is regarded as one of the great novelists in English, although he did not speak the language fluently until he was in his twenties...
.
Life
Apollo Korzeniowski was born on February 21, 1820, in the Imperial RussianRussian Empire
The Russian Empire was a state that existed from 1721 until the Russian Revolution of 1917. It was the successor to the Tsardom of Russia and the predecessor of the Soviet Union...
village of Honoratka, then in Jampol County in what is now Vinnytsia Oblast
Vinnytsia Oblast
Vinnytsia Oblast is an oblast of Ukraine. Its administrative center is Vinnytsia.-Geography:The area of the region is 26,500 km²; its population is 1.7 million....
, Ukraine
Ukraine
Ukraine is a country in Eastern Europe. It has an area of 603,628 km², making it the second largest contiguous country on the European continent, after Russia...
. He was the son of Teodor Korzeniowski, an 1831 Polish Army captain, an impoverished nobleman who made a living running leaseholds, and Julia née
NEE
NEE is a political protest group whose goal was to provide an alternative for voters who are unhappy with all political parties at hand in Belgium, where voting is compulsory.The NEE party was founded in 2005 in Antwerp...
Dyakiewicz.
After graduating from secondary school
Secondary school
Secondary school is a term used to describe an educational institution where the final stage of schooling, known as secondary education and usually compulsory up to a specified age, takes place...
in Żytomierz, Apollo studied law and Oriental studies at the University of St. Petersburg, then returned to Ukraine, where in 1852 he became an estate manager in the Podole
Podole
Podole may refer to:*Podolia, a region in Ukraine*Podole, Aleksandrów County in Kuyavian-Pomeranian Voivodeship *Podole, Lipno County in Kuyavian-Pomeranian Voivodeship...
village of Łuczyniec.
In 1854, during the Crimean War
Crimean War
The Crimean War was a conflict fought between the Russian Empire and an alliance of the French Empire, the British Empire, the Ottoman Empire, and the Kingdom of Sardinia. The war was part of a long-running contest between the major European powers for influence over territories of the declining...
, Apollo took an active part in preparations to organize in Ukraine
Ukraine
Ukraine is a country in Eastern Europe. It has an area of 603,628 km², making it the second largest contiguous country on the European continent, after Russia...
—in the rears of the Russian armies fighting in Crimea
Crimea
Crimea , or the Autonomous Republic of Crimea , is a sub-national unit, an autonomous republic, of Ukraine. It is located on the northern coast of the Black Sea, occupying a peninsula of the same name...
—a Polish uprising. It came to nought due to British and French reluctance to get involved in the Polish cause.
In April 1856, Apollo married Ewelina Bobrowska, sister of Tadeusz Bobrowski and Stefan Bobrowski. Together with his mother-in-law, Apollo leased the village of Derebczynka. On December 3, 1857, the Korzeniowskis welcomed into the world their only child, Józef Teodor Konrad, the future English-language novelist Joseph Conrad
Joseph Conrad
Joseph Conrad was a Polish-born English novelist.Conrad is regarded as one of the great novelists in English, although he did not speak the language fluently until he was in his twenties...
.
In early 1859, after losing all their fortune on the leasehold, the Korzeniowskis moved permanently to Żytomierz, where Apollo for a time served as secretary of a bookselling and publishing association and became a member of the board of directors of a Polish theater.
It was Korzeniowski's years at Łuczyniec, Derebczynka and Żytomierz that saw the greatest flowering of his literary creativity. His first substantial work was a manuscript cycle of religious-patriotic poems, Purgatorial Songs (Czyśćcowe pieśni, 1849–54), which came into being under the clear—and none too fortunate—influence of Zygmunt Krasiński
Zygmunt Krasinski
Count Napoleon Stanisław Adam Ludwig Zygmunt Krasiński , a Polish count, is traditionally ranked with Mickiewicz and Słowacki as one of Poland's Three National Bards — the trio of great Romantic poets who influenced national consciousness during the period of Poland's political bondage.-Life and...
's poetry. Apollo overcame this influence only in the final poem of the cycle, "Forethunder" ("Przedgrom"), into which his earlier preparations for the unrealized uprising introduced revolution
Revolution
A revolution is a fundamental change in power or organizational structures that takes place in a relatively short period of time.Aristotle described two types of political revolution:...
ary accents. These accents also appeared in a manuscript cycle of poems written in 1855 at the news of the Tsarist Army's bloody suppression of a peasant revolt in Skvira County.
In 1854 Korzeniowski wrote his chef d'oeuvre, the drama Komedia (Comedy), its beginning parts modeled after Aleksandr Griboyedov's comedy, Gorie ot uma (Woe from Wit
Woe from Wit
Woe from Wit is Alexander Griboyedov's comedy in verse, satirizing the society of post-Napoleonic Moscow, or, as a high official in the play styled it, "a pasquinade on Moscow."The play, written in 1823 in the countryside and in Tiflis, was not passed by the censorship for the stage, and...
). In Comedy, Korzeniowski severely criticized the Polish nobility in Ukraine and opposed it to two positive heroes—Henryk, a revolutionary-conspirator, and the Secretary, a cowed plebeian who, as the action develops, rebels against his employer. The play's 1855 publication (together with a lyric cycle, Stray Strophe
Strophe
A strophe forms the first part of the ode in Ancient Greek tragedy, followed by the antistrophe and epode. In its original Greek setting, "strophe, antistrophe and epode were a kind of stanza framed only for the music," as John Milton wrote in the preface to Samson Agonistes, with the strophe...
s—Strofy oderwane) became a social scandal. Little wonder that Comedy, severely treated by the critics, could not get onto the stage.
In 1858 Korzeniowski published a second drama, For a Pretty Penny (Dla miłego grosza), which was to some extent a continuation of Comedy. The new play likewise contained criticism of the wealthy Polish nobility in Ukraine, which was passing over to new, capitalist
Capitalism
Capitalism is an economic system that became dominant in the Western world following the demise of feudalism. There is no consensus on the precise definition nor on how the term should be used as a historical category...
methods of management; this time, however, the criticized milieu
Milieu
Milieu is the word for environment in French, and, for hundreds of years, also in Dutch, Swedish, English, and other languages that were strongly influenced by French culture and French language, primarily during the 17th and 18th centuries....
was contrasted only with an old nobleman-conservative who desperately clung to the feudal system.
Apart from original work, Korzeniowski did translation
Translation
Translation is the communication of the meaning of a source-language text by means of an equivalent target-language text. Whereas interpreting undoubtedly antedates writing, translation began only after the appearance of written literature; there exist partial translations of the Sumerian Epic of...
s, including Alfred de Vigny
Alfred de Vigny
Alfred Victor de Vigny was a French poet, playwright, and novelist.-Life:Alfred de Vigny was born in Loches into an aristocratic family...
's 1835 drama Chatterton and several works by Victor Hugo
Victor Hugo
Victor-Marie Hugo was a Frenchpoet, playwright, novelist, essayist, visual artist, statesman, human rights activist and exponent of the Romantic movement in France....
: Hernani
Hernani (drama)
----Hernani is a drama by the French romantic author Victor Hugo.The play opened in Paris on February 25, 1830...
, Marion Delorme
Marion Delorme (Hugo)
Marion Delorme is a play by Victor Hugo in 5 acts, about the famous French courtesan of that name. It was first presented in 1831....
and fragments of La Légende des siècles. He also wrote much correspondence to the Warsaw
Warsaw
Warsaw is the capital and largest city of Poland. It is located on the Vistula River, roughly from the Baltic Sea and from the Carpathian Mountains. Its population in 2010 was estimated at 1,716,855 residents with a greater metropolitan area of 2,631,902 residents, making Warsaw the 10th most...
newspapers.
At the turn of the 1850s and 1860s, Korzeniowski once again engaged in socio-political activity. Thus, in April 1861 he took part, at Żytomierz, in deliberations by delegates of the nobility from the three guberniya
Guberniya
A guberniya was a major administrative subdivision of the Russian Empire usually translated as government, governorate, or province. Such administrative division was preserved for sometime upon the collapse of the empire in 1917. A guberniya was ruled by a governor , a word borrowed from Latin ,...
s comprising Rus Province—deliberations whose aim was the creation, with the help of the guberniya Agricultural Associations, of a common Polish organization for the Rus and Lithuanian provinces; Korzeniowski proposed then sending the Tsar
Tsar
Tsar is a title used to designate certain European Slavic monarchs or supreme rulers. As a system of government in the Tsardom of Russia and Russian Empire, it is known as Tsarist autocracy, or Tsarism...
a demand to join the two provinces administratively to the Congress Poland
Congress Poland
The Kingdom of Poland , informally known as Congress Poland , created in 1815 by the Congress of Vienna, was a personal union of the Russian parcel of Poland with the Russian Empire...
.
In May 1861, hearing of a patriotic movement developing in Warsaw
Warsaw
Warsaw is the capital and largest city of Poland. It is located on the Vistula River, roughly from the Baltic Sea and from the Carpathian Mountains. Its population in 2010 was estimated at 1,716,855 residents with a greater metropolitan area of 2,631,902 residents, making Warsaw the 10th most...
, Korzeniowski traveled from Żytomierz to Warsaw. There he sought the right to publish a radical socio-literary Biweekly (Dwutygodnik). Initially he associated himself with K. Majewski, who would later name him in testimony as his deputy in a "triumvirate
Triumvirate
A triumvirate is a political regime dominated by three powerful individuals, each a triumvir . The arrangement can be formal or informal, and though the three are usually equal on paper, in reality this is rarely the case...
." Korzeniowski, however, distanced himself from Majewski due to the latter's contacts with the "Whites" and became close to more radical groups, especially to youth in the Academy of Fine Arts (Akademia Sztuk Pięknych) and to the "Red" representative, Ignacy Chmieleński, who would become the chief of the National Government (Rząd Narodowy) during the January 1863 Uprising
January Uprising
The January Uprising was an uprising in the former Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth against the Russian Empire...
.
Korzeniowski became a leading organizer of political demonstrations. He helped organize celebrations of the anniversary of the Union of Lublin
Union of Lublin
The Union of Lublin replaced the personal union of the Kingdom of Poland and the Grand Duchy of Lithuania with a real union and an elective monarchy, since Sigismund II Augustus, the last of the Jagiellons, remained childless after three marriages. In addition, the autonomy of Royal Prussia was...
, was an organizer of a demonstration connected with the funeral of Archbishop
Archbishop
An archbishop is a bishop of higher rank, but not of higher sacramental order above that of the three orders of deacon, priest , and bishop...
A. Fijałkowski, and was the chief initiator of celebrations of the anniversary of the Union of Horodło. He also worked to organize a boycott
Boycott
A boycott is an act of voluntarily abstaining from using, buying, or dealing with a person, organization, or country as an expression of protest, usually for political reasons...
of municipal elections that were scheduled to begin in Warsaw on September 23, 1861.
When this effort failed and martial law
Martial law
Martial law is the imposition of military rule by military authorities over designated regions on an emergency basis— only temporary—when the civilian government or civilian authorities fail to function effectively , when there are extensive riots and protests, or when the disobedience of the law...
was declared in the Congress Poland
Congress Poland
The Kingdom of Poland , informally known as Congress Poland , created in 1815 by the Congress of Vienna, was a personal union of the Russian parcel of Poland with the Russian Empire...
, Korzeniowski was one of the chief initiators in forming (October 17, 1861) a Municipal Committee (Komitet Miejski)—the supreme authority of the "Red" conspiracy.
On the night of October 20–21, 1861, Korzeniowski was arrested and placed in the infamous Tenth Pavilion of the Warsaw Citadel
Warsaw Citadel
Cytadela is a 19th-century fortress in Warsaw, Poland. It was built by order of Tsar Nicholas I after the suppression of the 1830 November Uprising in order to bolster imperial Russian control of the city. It served as a prison into the late 1930s.- History :The Citadel was built by personal...
. In May 1862 he was sentenced by a court martial to exile in Vologda
Vologda
Vologda is a city and the administrative, cultural, and scientific center of Vologda Oblast, Russia, located on the Vologda River. The city is a major transport knot of the Northwest of Russia. Vologda is among the Russian cities possessing an especially valuable historical heritage...
; a year later, this was commuted to Chernigov.
In exile, Korzeniowski resumed his literary work. He produced a memoir on "Poland and Moscow" ("Polska i Moskwa," published in a periodical in 1864); a fragment of a play, No Rescue (Bez ratunku); and a "Study of Drama in the Works of Shakespeare" ("Studia nad dramatycznością w utworach Szekspira"). He also translated Charles Dickens
Charles Dickens
Charles John Huffam Dickens was an English novelist, generally considered the greatest of the Victorian period. Dickens enjoyed a wider popularity and fame than had any previous author during his lifetime, and he remains popular, having been responsible for some of English literature's most iconic...
' Hard Times
Hard Times
Hard Times - For These Times is the tenth novel by Charles Dickens, first published in 1854. The book appraises English society and is aimed at highlighting the social and economic pressures of the times....
and Shakespeare's Comedy of Errors
The Comedy of Errors
The Comedy of Errors is one of William Shakespeare's earliest plays. It is his shortest and one of his most farcical comedies, with a major part of the humour coming from slapstick and mistaken identity, in addition to puns and word play. The Comedy of Errors is one of only two of Shakespeare's...
.
At Chernigov, in 1865, Korzeniowski's wife Ewelina died of tuberculosis
Tuberculosis
Tuberculosis, MTB, or TB is a common, and in many cases lethal, infectious disease caused by various strains of mycobacteria, usually Mycobacterium tuberculosis. Tuberculosis usually attacks the lungs but can also affect other parts of the body...
. In late 1867, Korzeniowski himself, on account of his poor health (tuberculosis and heart disease
Heart disease
Heart disease, cardiac disease or cardiopathy is an umbrella term for a variety of diseases affecting the heart. , it is the leading cause of death in the United States, England, Canada and Wales, accounting for 25.4% of the total deaths in the United States.-Types:-Coronary heart disease:Coronary...
), was released from exile and allowed to leave Russia. In early 1868 he went with his son Konrad to Lviv
Lviv
Lviv is a city in western Ukraine. The city is regarded as one of the main cultural centres of today's Ukraine and historically has also been a major Polish and Jewish cultural center, as Poles and Jews were the two main ethnicities of the city until the outbreak of World War II and the following...
, in Austria
Austria
Austria , officially the Republic of Austria , is a landlocked country of roughly 8.4 million people in Central Europe. It is bordered by the Czech Republic and Germany to the north, Slovakia and Hungary to the east, Slovenia and Italy to the south, and Switzerland and Liechtenstein to the...
n-occupied Poland. A year later they moved to Kraków
Kraków
Kraków also Krakow, or Cracow , is the second largest and one of the oldest cities in Poland. Situated on the Vistula River in the Lesser Poland region, the city dates back to the 7th century. Kraków has traditionally been one of the leading centres of Polish academic, cultural, and artistic life...
, likewise in Austrian Poland, where Apollo could work with the recently founded democratic daily, Kraj (Homeland).
On May 23, 1869, Korzeniowski died in Kraków. He was interred in the Rakowicki Cemetery
Rakowicki Cemetery
Rakowicki Cemetery is one of the best known cemeteries of Poland, located in the centre of Kraków. It lies within the Administrative District No. 1 Stare Miasto meaning "Old Town" – not to be confused with the historic Kraków Old Town further west...
. Over his grave stands a monument designed by sculptor Walery Gadomski.
Legacy
Apollo Korzeniowski was long remembered merely as the father of English-language novelist Joseph ConradJoseph Conrad
Joseph Conrad was a Polish-born English novelist.Conrad is regarded as one of the great novelists in English, although he did not speak the language fluently until he was in his twenties...
. It was only with the astonishing world premiere of Apollo's Comedy in Wrocław in 1952, nearly a century after it had been written in 1854, that attention was brought to Apollo Korzeniowski as an important literary personality and man of action in his own right.
Approximately two weeks before his death Korzeniowski supervised the burning of all the manuscripts of his own work that he had in his possession. His son recalled: "I happened to go into his room a little earlier than usual that evening, and remaining unnoticed stayed to watch the nursing-sister feeding the blaze in the fire-place." However, a few manuscripts and a series of letters written before and during his exile to his most intimate friends survived in the possession of others.
See also
- List of Polish-language poets
- List of playwrights by nationality and date of birth