The journey of the romantic protagonist to the end : poetic (epic?) novels of the early romanticism

Recenzowane materiały z konferencji: Romantycy na krańcach świata. Podróże egzotyczne i peregrynacje wewnętrzne; 2014-04-24; 2014-04-24; Kraków. Streszcz. po ang., bibliogr.

The paper presents and analyzes the statements of authors who saw a new type of epic in the Polish early romanticism poetic novels of Maria by Malaczewski and Zamek Kaniowski by Goszczyński. Maria and Zamek Kaniowski present two different ways of cognition and observation of the outside world. Goszczyński uses the epic construction, while in the novel by Malczewski the cognition is only possible through the prism of mind and feelings, and its limits are set by the individual for itself. Regardless of this substantial difference there were many voices in the 19th century, which treated both of those poetic novels as contemporary examples of the hero epic. The article presents how different were the criteria and causes that formed the basis for such classification, and also concerns the genre and esthetic consciousness of romanticism regarding the understanding of the term "epic".