Kresy (Polish Eastern Borderlands) in Polish literature of the period of 1918–2018. Significant interpretative perspectives

Abstract

The paper offers a comprehensive, synthetic account of the Polish Eastern Borderland discourse on the subject over the course of the last century. It analyzes the ways in which the understanding of the notion of Kresy and “borderland”, as well as the strategies of presenting the term have been changing, including the attempts to replace this category with other terms. Furthermore, the paper characterizes the dynamics concerning the transformations of situational contexts which emerged in the period of the Second Polish Republic, developed in the times of World War II, after 1945 (in the country and abroad), and continue from the 80s and 90s of the twentieth century to our present. Significant interpretative perspectives include, among others, the trend of literary schools, the legend and myth of Polish Eastern Borderland, the notion of the borderline of cultures, small homelands, and methodological phrases and breakthroughs (spatial turn, geopoetics, postcolonial criticism).