POLISH LITERARY GROUP “SCAMANDER”: REQUIREMENTS FOR EMERGENCE

Abstract

“Scamander” as a literary phenomenon derived its origins from French poetry. The literary life of the entire Western Europe significantly revived in the first half of the 20th century. This influenced the dynamic development of the publishing, dramatic, and literary activities of Polish artists and their search for new forms of expressing reality. Before the First World War, Polish literature was also characterized by the desire to create a new direction of poetry, which fully manifested itself precisely in the era of the interwar twenty years. They were reflected in two main currents – classicism and Franciscanism. These two directions of the development of Polish literature were not only not separated from each other, but also mostly overlapped. One of the most vivid examples of such complementarity can be considered the works of Leopold Staff, who was imitated by almost all representatives of the Scamandrite direction at the early stage of his work and who became the first and most influential mentor of this literary circle. This movement was closely related to reality and conveyed the spirit of the era. Soon, a magazine of the same name was created on the basis of the world-view of the innovative poets, which united supporters of “everyday” poetry. The Scamandrites introduced unseen motifs into the images of everyday life: spontaneity, vitalism, biologism, etc. and were distinguished primarily by the fact that the early stage of their work coincided with the key events of national liberation and independence of Poland. The main representatives of this poetic group were Julian Tuwim, Jan Lechoń, Kazimierz Wierzyński, Jarosław Iwaszkiewicz and Antoni Słonimski. In the article, the authors focus their attention on the prerequisites for the emergence, formation and ideological and aesthetic positions of the representatives of the Polish poetic group “Scamander”. The research focuses on the common literary tendencies of the representatives of this poetic movement and the differences in the perception of the interwar reality. The relevance of the themes and ideas on which the poets focused their attention and their role in the Polish literary discourse is noted. Parallels with the previous literary era are drawn. Those writers whose work was related to the Scamander literary group are indicated. The authors of the study emphasize the uniqueness of the poetic group “Scamander” in the Polish literature of the interwar twenty years.