The novel as third space in the fight for one’s own place: Witold Gombrowicz hidden polemic with German literature in Pornografia

Abstract

This paper deals with Gombrowicz’s novel Pornografia which is interpreted as a third space where different literary discourses and philosophical concepts are interwoven. Of a special interest are in this respect two German authors: Thomas Mann and Friedrich Nietzsche. It is the aim of this article to show, to what extent Gombrowicz refers to writings of these two authors in his attempt to establish himself as an important writer in the conditions of his exile in Argentina. The novel Pornografia works in this respect as sphere of interferences and space of emerging hybridity, where Gombrowicz is creating a special textuality consisting of hidden references to and even polemics with Mann and Nietzsche, respectively. The notion of conflict is thus applicable in the description of the literary practice Gombrowicz resorts to in writing his novel.