Pamiętnik Teatralny

In the Laboratory of Modernity

Patryk Kencki — Tue, 16 Sep 2025 00:00:00 +0200

Introduction to to essay-cluster Modernity laboratory: Theatre of the 18th century.

Leafing through Theatre: Touch, Paper, and Ink in the Life of a Drama, from Kochanowski’s "The Dismissal of the Greek Envoys" to Mickiewicz’s "Forefathers’ Eve"

Michał Bajer — Tue, 16 Sep 2025 00:00:00 +0200

While research on drama has usually focused on its stage reception, in early modern culture other forms of the social presence of theatrical texts were important as well. The article examines the way authors and readers engaged with dramatic writings between the late 16th and the mid 19th century. Tactile and visual impressions induced by the material properties of the manuscript or print played an important role in these experiences. The argument is organised around the various practices of old-time producers and recipients of dramatic writings: paper making and printing, bookbinding, the secular use of the printing press, organising book collections, and annotating the texts by hand. The article concludes with a description of practices related to the aestheticisation of written drama during social situations of a performative and sometimes even quasi-theatrical nature.

“A balloon for St. Stanisław’s Day:” The Commission of National Education vis-à-vis Public Spectacles and School Theatre

Katarzyna Buczek — Tue, 16 Sep 2025 00:00:00 +0200

This article discusses how the National Education Commission, the first Polish state authority supervising schools, approached spectacles, including school theatre. Scientific spectacles, such as demonstrations of science experiments, public lectures featuring experiments, and even student exams open to the public, were highly valued and encouraged from both college and secondary school professors. This was in line with the general interests of the era (balloons and electric machines in particular sparked curiosity) and gave schools the opportunity to build a positive image. Meanwhile, school theatre, which had been an important aspect of Jesuit and Piarist schools for two centuries, raised objections from the Commission, which does not mean that schools strictly complied with the bans on organising performances. The article analyses source texts such as normative acts (laws, instructions), school reports, periodicals, correspondence, and dissertations.

“For the State, Theatre Is Above All Entertainment”: The Repertoire of the Łazienki Theatres under the Reign of Stanisław August

Patryk Kencki — Tue, 16 Sep 2025 00:00:00 +0200

The author examines the repertoire of the Łazienki royal theatres (the Small Theatre, the Orangery Theatre, and the Island Theatre) during the reign of Stanisław August, based on archival sources. Although this topic has already been explored in theatre historiography, previous findings required verification, and the archival material called for a fresh interpretation. Among the thirty-six titles that can be confidently attributed to the Łazienki stages, most were ballets d’action. In addition, French comic operas and eighteenth-century comedies were frequently performed. The repertoire choices reflected a compromise between the king’s artistic ambitions, the aim of attracting audiences and offering them refined entertainment, and the desire to use theatre for political and image-building purposes.

Pretend Prisons: Piranesi’s "Carceri" as Interpreted by Jan Bogumił Plersch

Aleksandra Bernatowicz — Tue, 16 Sep 2025 00:00:00 +0200

This article offers a discussion and formal interpretation of previously undescribed drawings by Jan Bogumił Plersch, depicting prison interiors modelled on engravings from Giambattista Piranesi’s Carceri d’Invenzione. The text is based on historical sources and the modest reference literature available to date. The comparative method, focusing on the formal features of the sketches, has made it possible to identify in Plersch’s works qualities original in relation to Piranesi’s etchings.

The French Revolution and Freedom of Spectacles: From Complete Liberalisation to Strict Control (1789-1793)

Tomasz Wysłobocki — Tue, 16 Sep 2025 00:00:00 +0200

Neither the storming of the Bastille nor the subsequent Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen ushered in a significant liberalisation of France’s theatrical institutions. For months afterwards, the royal theatres clung tenaciously to their privileges and monopolies, stifling the growth of private scenes. Meanwhile, they were unlikely to join the public effort for the moral regeneration of the nation. Under mounting public pressure, the National Assembly finally enacted a decree on freedom of spectacles in January 1791. Henceforth, any citizen could establish a theatre to stage productions of their choice, including the works of classical authors. The power to determine what was seen on stage shifted from royal censors and privileged troupes to the discerning eye of the audience. Yet, as the Republic faced escalating radicalisation, war, and civil unrest, it became imperative to reassert control over theatrical institutions, which had become battlegrounds for supporters and detractors of the Revolution. The young Republic’s survival hinged on its citizens’ identification with its new values and virtues, and the stage emerged as a potent vehicle for shaping this allegiance. The paper aims to trace some elements of this evolution within its historical, social and political context.

Trapped in Inversion: George Gordon Byron’s "Cain" as a Mystery Play

Alina Borkowska-Rychlewska — Tue, 16 Sep 2025 00:00:00 +0200

This article discusses mystery play qualities in Romantic drama, based on the example of George Gordon Byron’s Cain. Although the author himself captioned it as “a mystery,” neither the dramatic structure of the work nor its symbolic layer seems to closely relate to ancient or medieval mystery plays. In Cain, the poet primarily presents the epistemological meaning of the concept of mystery, namely the protagonist’s initiation into the supernatural order of existence. Focusing on an anthropological and teleological analysis of the meanings of Byron’s drama, the author argues that: 1) in Cain, the story of the first fratricide in human history is used as a perverse reference to the biblical, and especially New-Testament understanding of the concept of mystery; 2) the mystery of Cain, entangled at the level of dramatic fiction in various dialectical relationships (the sacred and the profane, truth and illusion, good and evil, thought and action, loneliness and community), soteriological terms; 3) Byron’s work is an intertextual game (played with the Bible, Milton’s Paradise Lost, and Shakespeare’s Macbeth, among others); 4) as “a mystery,” Cain proves to be an excellent vehicle for revealing the meanings of the Romantic dialectic of being and transgressing the boundaries of the human condition.

The Mystery of Helena Modjeska’s First and Last Kraków Photographs: The Walery Rzewuski’s and Józef Sebald’s Glass Negatives in the Jagiellonian Library Collection

Agnieszka Wanicka — Tue, 16 Sep 2025 00:00:00 +0200

The article focuses on a unique collection of glass negatives held at the Jagiellonian Library in Kraków. These works, created by the esteemed Polish photographers Walery Rzewuski (1865–1869) and Józef Sebald (1903), capture the actress Helena Modjeska in her first and last photographic sessions in her hometown. In 2024, the negatives were digitized for the first time at the Museum of Photography in Kraków, resulting in digital copies identical to the originals. By reconstructing the history of the relationship between the actress and Rzewuski based on various sources, the article examines the phenomenon of Modjeska’s earliest character portraits and investigates the talent of one of the first Polish theatre photographers. Inspired by Geoffrey Batchen’s Negative/Positive: A History of Photography (2021), the author demonstrates how examining negatives can shift our perspective on the understanding of photography, including theatre photography.

Walking as a Femist Practice: First Steps

Agnieszka Sosnowska — Tue, 16 Sep 2025 00:00:00 +0200

This text proposes critical reflection on walking as a potential emancipatory practice. The starting point is the performance Armour by the Afghan artist Kubra Khamedi, presented as a symbolic and political intervention in public space. The main argument is that ‘walking as a feminist practice’ is a postulate. The existing artistic canon is dominated by men. The author refers to the work of artists such as Marina Abramović, Adrian Piper, Teresa Murak and Trisha Brown, juxtaposing them with the masculinele figures of the flâneur and the vagabond. The article is set in the broader context of cultural research on art. and public space, drawing, among other references, on texts by Judith Butler and reflections on the art of walking by Rebecca Solnit. Walking is presented as a practice of resistance and emancipation that can redefine public space and challenge existing gender norms.