Szymborska Research

Directions
For next class, please prepare a handout containing notes or a Google Slide presentation (5
minutes or less) on one of the topics below.
● Please copy and paste the URLs of the sources you use so that classmates can follow
the links for further reading.  
● Try to make your handout or presentation visually appealing.
● Use bullet points rather than long paragraphs of text.
● Your notes/presentation should be shared with Ms. Rismann and members of our
class.

4. Symborksa was deeply involved with many political parties and unions after the war. What
were the defining platforms of these parties that she supported? Were they for the everyday
man or for the rich? How would these ideas tie into her poetry? What were the changes in the
party ideals that made her switch her allegiance?

Parties she supported

● Early in her career, Symborksa adhered to the People’s Republic of Poland’s
(PRL) ideology.
● Became a member of the ruling Polish United Workers’ Party which became the
dominant political party in PRL, making it a socialist country.
● Although the Polish Communist Party shifted from the Stalinist communists to
"national" communists, Szymborska grew estranged from socialist ideology.
● The ideals of Stalinism mainly included rapid industrialization and intensification
of class conflict, which would benefit the rich, not the everyday man.
● As Stalin and the Communist leaders became more and more dictatorial, she
became disillusioned with politics, changed her views, denounced her earlier
poetry.
● Szymborska did not leave the communist party until 1966, but she began to
establish contacts with dissidents.

Her Switch in Allegiance

● In early 1957, she befriended Jerzy Giedroyc, the editor of the influential
Paris-based émigré journal Kultura, to which she also contributed.
● In 1964, she opposed a Communist-backed protest to The Times against
independent intellectuals, demanding freedom of speech instead.
● In the 1980s, she intensified her oppositional activities, contributing to the
samizdat periodical Arka under the pseudonym "Stańczykówna", as well as to
the Paris-based Kultura → was eventually writing articles against the Communist
leaders of Poland.
● In the early 1990s, she supported the vote of no-confidence in the first
non-Communist government. Thereby bringing former Communists back to
power.
Example Poems
● Her debut collection Dlatego żyjemy (1952: “That's Why We Are All Alive”)
supported socialist themes.
○ Contains the poems "Lenin" and "Młodzieży budującej Nową Hutę" ("For
the Youth who are building Nowa Huta") → about the construction of a
Stalinist industrial town near Kraków.
○ Nowa Huta
● Her later work has been more personal and relatively apolitical (e.g. "Children of
This Age")
● The 1957 collection of poems, "Calling out to Yeti" marks her first break with
socialist-realist literature. (e.g. "Still Life with Toy Balloon")