On the notion of probability in the aesthetic and literary awareness of the late enlightenment period

Strona wydawcy: https://www.wuj.pl

The aim of this paper is to show how the principle of probability was understood in aesthetic and literary critical papers of Polish Enlightenment, and to demonstrate its importance, particularly in reference to the first decades of the 19th century. It is emphasised that probability was prerequisite in reference to both physical world occurrences and thoughts and feelings of literary protagonists. It is also stressed that it was acceptable to diverge from the truth for the sake of didactic function of a text, of social acceptability of what is presented in it or of certain idealisation of nature’s works. But particular stress is put here on quite detailed utterances formulated in this respect by Euzebiusz Słowacki and Józef Korzeniowski. Among others, they are indicative of the upcoming changes in the understanding of the principle of probability (for instance, in relation to the concept of an ‘ideal model’), which becomes unimportant in the aesthetics of Romanticism as the mimetic concept of poetry is rejected.