Natalia Borisova1; 1 University of Tuebingen Slavic Department, Germany
Discussion
This presentation will focus on the development of the canon of narratives about women's fate in post-reform Poland. Novels by authors such as Bolesław Prus and Eliza Orzeszkowa tell the consistent story of women who have fallen outside the boundaries of their social class and prescribed social roles, and who are forced to live and act independently. I will primarily focus on the texts of Eliza Orzeszkowa, examining how she, as a leading author of Polish positivism, shapes the image of women in Polish society, and to what extent she sets her heroines apart from the literary constructs of her male competitors. To what extent is her own experience as a female author reflected in her texts, in which her heroines also strive for economic independence? How does she depict the conflict between patriarchal norms and the capitalist challenge in her texts, between which her heroines are forced to find a way?
