The article 'On the twenty-fifth anniversary of the death of Eliza Orzeszkowa', published in the periodical 'Świat', 1935, no. 24, pp. 6-7 (public domain, reprinted after the Mazovian Digital Library), containing a biography of the writer, is illustrated with a photograph of the manor house in Grodno, where she lived from 1894 to 1910. The manor house now houses the Eliza Orzeszkowa Museum.

A modernised reading of the text

Eliza Orzeszkowa's manor house in Grodno.

18 May marked the twenty-fifth anniversary of the death of the author of 'Above the Niemen'. This moment, as always in such cases, stimulates reflection on the historical role of the writer in life and literature and, just as importantly, on the contemporary, inner meaning of her work. To what extent Orzeszkowa's work has become a monument, an ideologically and artistically dead document, and to what extent it has remained a collection of wisdom and beauty untouched by time - this is the question to be resolved.

The author of "Cham" was born into a wealthy landed gentry family near Grodno in 1841. Her childhood and first youth were not at all promising for a future teacher and leader of her generation. It was not until the preceding year, 63, that Eliza transformed herself from a mediocre, empty salon doll into a mature woman, noble, strong and aware of her aims. The national defeat, the fall of the uprising and the subsequent severe repression by the Tsarist government did not break Orzeszkowa.

Although she loses her property and has to struggle hard and alone with her fate, she does not give up - and wins. She soon realises her vocation as a writer and, in 1866, prints her first work in the "Tygodnik Ilustrowanym": "A picture of the hunger years". From then until the end of her long life, Orzeszkowa remained a writer, a writer by vocation and passion, prolific, diligent and attentive to all new manifestations in Polish life. The year 1863 left an indelible mark on the life and works of the author of "Marta", as well as on the whole epoch known in the history of literature as the positivist epoch.

The defeat of the armed uprising revealed the impossibility of regaining independence and turned the nation to down-to-earth work that was to lay the foundations for a new national life. The upheaval in economic relations caused by the sudden enfranchisement of peasants in the Russian partition brought about serious social disorders, the ruin of the aristocracy and the unstable situation of the middle gentry, who lost their free labour force overnight. Hence, so many at the time were "blasted out of the saddle", i.e. bankrupt landowners who, having lost their property, moved to the larger cities, destitute and without preparation for professional work.

These two phenomena, i.e. national disaster and upheaval in economic relations, form the background for Orzeszkowa's first speech. Our author herself experienced the practical consequences of these changes, which made her think all the more about the new living conditions and the new attitude to life that resulted from them as a hard necessity. Thus, the entire multi-volume work of Orzeszkowa from her first period, from "Pictures from the Hunger Years" (1866) to "Moore's Elka" (1874), is full of advice, admonitions and recommendations. Pieces from this period, i.e. "Ostatnia miłość", "Na prowincji", "Pamiętnik Wacławy", "Marta", "Rodzina Brochwiczów", proclaim theses, develop programmes, exhort and admonish.

It is also not surprising that today no one reads, for example, "The Brochwicz Family" or "Mr Graba". Gradually, slowly and over a long period of time, Orzeszkowa reached her maturity and artistic perfection. Her characters, from stiff mannequins, began to transform into lively and full human beings, the author's direct expressions disappeared, while her subtlety in depicting mental states and sensitivity to the external side of reality increased. The writer's first masterpiece is 'Meir Ezofowicz' (1877).

Although the closer, strict tendency of this novel (a passionate belief in the beneficial light of knowledge) is linked to the era and seems a little outdated to us today, what captivates in this work is after all the lofty idealism of the title character, a protagonist whose simplicity and truth still appeals to today's readers. "Meir Ezofovich" is imbued with a belief in the rightness and effectiveness of positivist ideals such as knowledge, work, progress, social solidarity. Around 1880, however, this faith of Orzeszkowa's breaks down. It is then that the young generation, imbued with social radicalism blowing in from the East and hostile to tradition and the past, takes to the stage. Socialist currents emerge and quickly gain a strong influence on young souls.

These currents terrify Orzeszkowa. Her patriotic conscience is outraged by the cosmopolitanism of the new youth, and she sees in socialism a drive to destroy social bonds, a desire to use without a sense of responsibility for the good of the whole. These phenomena are described by the author in a series of novels, such as: "Sylwek cmentarnik" (1880), "Spectres" (1880), "The Primitives" (1881). And they are not among her best works. In her characterisation of unsympathetic social symptoms, Orzeszkowa exaggerates, exaggerates, creates caricatures instead of people. Only in the following period does the author renounce all propaganda and tendencies, and her artistry finally reaches its highest peaks.

Within a few years, a number of outstanding works were created, those that we read and admire to this day. "Dziurdziowie" (1885), "Nad Niemnem" (1886) and "Cham" (1887) are masterpieces that will forever remain the purest, luminous jewels of Polish literature. The author sends her novels out into the world from the quiet, sunken town of Grodno, where she was assigned a place of forced residence by the Russian government. Isolated and alone, Orzeszkowa lived and worked for many years in an uncultured, alien to Polish society. However, she was surrounded by the general reverence of the Polish society; eminent people, writers, artists, scholars often visited Mrs Eliza in her solitary house in Grodno, numerous admirers and admirers flooded her with letters, and the celebration of the twenty-fifth anniversary of her work in 1891 was a magnificent manifestation, testifying to the general tribute of the nation to its spiritual guide.

For nearly fifty years Orzeszkowa took an active part in the spiritual life of Poland, as a guide and representative of the generation with which she lived through youthful defeat, manly maturity and painful old age. This generation passed out of the audience of history and with them Orzeszkowa passed as a chastiser, moralist and reformer. There is, however, another Orzeszkowa, a great artist, author of several novels and a dozen or so novellas of enduring value.