Sebald czyta Schulza (z ołówkiem w ręku)

Abstrakt

The article deals with W.G. Sebald’s reception of Bruno Schulz’s writings and is the result of research conducted at the German Literature Archive (Deutsches Literaturar- chiv) in Marbach on the Neckar, which holds Sebald’s legacy – i.e., his library and manuscripts. The author of the article discusses the marginalia (underlined words and passages) contained in Sebald’s copy of the volume Die Republik der Träume (Schulz’s writings in German translation), as well as the text of five fiches containing quotes from Schulz written down by Sebald. Basing on the analysis of these material traces, the author of the essay tries to reconstruct Sebald’s reading and reception of Schulz’s work. On the one hand, Sebald seems to view Schulz’s stories rather stereotypically as examples of Jewish and Holocaust literature. On the other, he interprets them in a surprising and unusual way, finding in Schulz ecological reflection or criticism of colonialism. Above all, however, Sebald looks in Schulz for motifs and reflections that confirm his own writing choices, as well as passages that could characterize the protagonists of his own fiction. These themes include: psychoanalysis as a context for literary criticism; violence against people, nature and things; junk and mannequins; human and animal beings with deformed anatomy, hovering between animate and inanimate matter; cabinets of curiosities and the proliferation of nature; architecture, landscape and specific shaping of space; the myth and metaphor of the abducted queen. The impact of Schulz’s poetics and philosophical concepts is also confirmed by the cryptic quotations that Sebald uses to interpret other German-language writers, such as Gerhard Roth, in his critical essays. The motifs Sebald pointed out in reading Schulz and underlini g his text shed light on some unique affinities and analogies between the two writers.