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I mentioned in an earlier post that I have a list of most of the characters by Bolesław Prus’ The Doll. I enjoyed the novel quite a bit and hope that others will take the plunge on reading it. Toward that end I’m posting my list of character names. As you can see there are […]
Mariusz Dmochowski as Stanisław WokulskiContinuing with my sort-of-biweekly foreign movie posts for this year… For more foreign movies, check out Caroline’s World Cinema Series 2012 and Richard’s monthly Foreign Film Festival round-up. I am always interested in watching movie adaptations of books I’ve read and enjoy passing along the ones I watch. In the case […]
By coincidence, tomorrow marks the centenary of the death of Bolesław Prus (real name Aleksander Głowacki). You’ll be hearing more about him from me since I thoroughly enjoyed The Doll and plan to read his later novel Pharaoh soon. The Doll takes place over an eighteen-month period during 1878-9 and looks at Polish society, with […]
There are many other topics included in The Doll that would make interesting posts, such as Prus’ view of women’s rights (or simply the relationship between men and women) and the Polish-Jewish conflict, but I’m going to end with excerpts that look at the author’s view on some of the problems of Poland. These quotes […]
The introductory post on The Doll mentions that Prus wished he had titled the book Three Generations. I’ve provided excerpts for the older generation (full-blown Romaticism represented by Ignacy Rzecki) and the middle one (Romanticism mixed with idealism, embodied by Stanisław Wokulski). The younger generation does not have quite the central role as the older […]
Ignacy Rzecki, oldest of the main characters and intended to represent the older, Romantic generation easily became my favorite character of the novel. The excerpts from his journal provide the reader flashbacks to important events in his as well as showing some of Wokulski’s formative years. During the Hungarian revolution of 1848 Rzecki and friends […]
There are few instances in world literature of a novel’s hero acquiring in the public eye all the characteristics of a live and tangible person, as did The Doll’s principle character, Stanisław Wokulski. Thus, between the two world wars, Prus’s admirers expressed their feelings by attaching a plaque to the wall of a Warsaw apartment […]
As I mentioned in the previous post on The Doll Izabela Łęcki, love of Stanisław Wokulski, seems to be more of a caricature than many more-rounded central characters Prus includes in the novel. The author still provides plenty of enjoyment during her appearances such as this extended quote, introducing her and providing some of her […]
I have been reading the Central European University Press version of Bolesław Prus’ The Doll (Hungary, 1996 paperback edition pictured above) and thoroughly enjoying it. The translation is by David Welsh with an introduction by Stanisław Barańczak. What looks to be the same translation is now available from the New York Review Books. I’m going […]