Enthralled by the archive. A review of the book by Lucyna Marzec, Papiery po Iłłakowiczównie. Archiwum jako przedmiot badań, Wydawnictwo IBL PAN, Warszawa 2022

Abstract

Upon reviewing the book by Lucyna Marzec Papiery po Iłłakowiczównie. Archiwum jako przedmiot badań, the author emphasizes its originality and an apt combination of the practice and theory of archive research based on a specific case study (the archive of Kazimiera Iłłakowiczówna), which has raised a number of questions and doubts as well as prompted many conciliatory solutions. These solution may prove helpful to future scholars attempting to grapple with both women and men writers’ archives. Marzec meticulously reconstructs the biography of the author of Szeptem, as well as she gives account of her own adventures in dealing with the archive and its contents over a long period of time. The researcher’s book is situated at the intersection of (auto)biographical and archival research, necessitating a theoretical framework ample enough to accommodate both archival practices and possible scenarios of dealing with the poet’s secrets and self-corrections, as well as the autobiographical practices that Iłłakowiczówna deliberately employed in order to reinforce a particular image of herself.

The author of the review comments not only on the way in which Marzec examines the ‘papers’ mentioned in the title, but also on the numerous comments concerning the prerequisites for a successful biography. Marzec’s book may serve as a model for subsequent researchers and an interesting proposal of a biography launched from the depths of the archive, featuring all the hallmarks of literary practices enshrined as the canon of the twentieth century.