A Romantic Twentieth-century Welsh View of Polish Literature from 1800–1945

Abstract

The article analyses one of the rare introductory works of Polish literature for a Welsh audience, i.e. the book Bannau Llên Pwyl ‘Highlights of Polish Literature’ produced by the Welsh scholar Thomas Hudson-Williams in 1953. First of all, astonishment is expressed, that there are only very few such works given the long record of massive immigration of Poles to Wales. Secondly, the work itself is analysed regarding its contents. As a result, a highly subjective approach to the literary works of Polish literature with clear emphasis on Romanticism can be noticed. In addition, most of the works selected seem to focus on what the target audience would supposedly like best. Considering the presentation of nearly all Polish titles in Welsh and a complete lack of any references, as well as the invention of titles for selected lines of poems, the specific character of Poland’s literature is hidden rather than promoted. In addition, in case potential Welsh readers were further interested in Polish literature and would have liked to read more from it, he or she would have had tremendous difficulties in finding out what to look for and how to get hold of the poems and prose works in question. Therefore, what is called, ‘The Highlights of Polish literature’ and which promised to be a nice surprise and an urgently needed book at the time turned out to be disappointment. Consequently, the question is posed, whether discovering a culture in rather a second-hand manner accounts for the problems outlined. Moreover, considering the insufficiencies of this overview, a more objective, updated work aimed at featuring culture-specific aspects of Polish literature is demanded.