Zygmunt Krasiński

Count Napoleon Stanisław Adam Feliks Zygmunt Krasiński
________________________________________ Portrait by Ary Scheffer
Born	(1812-02-19)19 February 1812 Paris, France
Died	23 February 1859(1859-02-23) (aged 47) Paris
Resting place	Opinogóra Górna
Occupation	Poet, writer
Language	Polish
Nationality	Polish
Citizenship	Russian
Period	1820s – 1859
Genre	dramas, lyrical poems, letters
Literary movement	Romanticism
Notable works	The Undivine Comedy Irydion Psalms of the Future
Spouse	Eliza Branicka
Children	with Eliza Branicka: Władysław Krasiński Zygmunt Jerzy Krasiński Maria Beatrix Krasińska Eliza Krasińska
Relatives	Wincenty Krasiński (father) Maria Urszula Radziwiłł (mother) the Krasiński family
Signature

Zygmunt Krasiński (Polish pronunciation: [ˈzɨɡmunt kraˈɕiɲskʲi]; 19 February 1812 – 23 February 1859) was a Polish nationalist poet traditionally ranked with Adam Mickiewicz and Juliusz Słowacki as one of Poland's Three Bards – the trio of Romantic poets who influenced national consciousness in the period of Poland's political bondage. He was the most famous member of the aristocratic Krasiński family.

Early on, his main works were considered to be the poems Przedświt (Predawn) and Psalms of the Future, but in time he became more known for his prose works, dramas, and letters. He authored two major dramas, The Undivine Comedy (his most famous and enduring work) and Irydion.

Life

Youth

Napoleon Stanisław Adam Feliks Zygmunt Krasiński was born in Paris on 19 February 1812 to Count Wincenty Krasiński, a Polish aristocrat and military commander, and Countess Maria Urszula Radziwiłł. He spent his first years in Chantilly, where Napoleon Bonaparte's Imperial Guard Regiment was stationed, and the Emperor himself attended his baptism. In 1814 the two-year-old moved with his parents to Warsaw, then part of the Duchy of Warsaw, ruled by Frederick Augustus I of Saxony as a client state of the First French Empire. Krasiński's cultivated and doting father employed prominent teachers and tutors, including Baroness Helena de la Haye, Józef Korzeniowski, and Piotr Chlebowski, to educate Zygmunt.

Krasiński, aged 7, by Louis-René Letronne, 1819

Following the stabilization brought by the end of the Napoleonic Wars, which saw the end of the Duchy of Warsaw and the creation of Congress Poland, the Krasiński family spent most summer vacations and holidays on their estates in Podole and Opinogóra. On 12 April 1822 Zygmunt's mother suddenly died of tuberculosis, and the ten-year-old boy became a precocious close companion to the family head, who instilled in Zygmunt a reverence for chivalry and honor. Zygmunt's fascination with his father's personality, and their hopes for a free Poland, led to an excessive, onerous mutual idealization.

In September 1826 Zygmunt entered the Warsaw Lyceum (a secondary school which Chopin had attended in 1823–26), graduating in the autumn of 1827. He began studies in law and administration at the Imperial University of Warsaw. However, a March 1829 altercation with another student over politics ended later that month in Krasiński's departure from the university.

From late May to mid-June he took his first journey abroad, to Vienna, with his father, who had previously traveled to Austria. In October 1829 Zygmunt left Poland to study abroad. Via Prague, Plzen, Regensburg, Zurich, and Bern, 17-year-old Krasiński arrived on 3 November 1829 in Geneva.

Literary travels

Much of Krasiński's time in Geneva was divided among social life, attendance at university lectures, and being tutored in subjects such as music. He soon mastered the French language, in which he became as fluent as in his native Polish. His Geneva stay was important to the shaping of the young writer's personality. Soon after arrival in Geneva, at the beginning of November 1829, he met Henry Reeve, a physician's son who was in Switzerland to study philosophy and literature. The talented young Englishman, who composed overwrought romantic poetry, greatly inspired young Krasiński. They became fast friends and exchanged letters discussing their love of classical and romantic literature.

At the beginning of 1830, Krasiński developed romantic feelings for Henrietta Willan, the daughter of a wealthy English merchant and tradesman. This relationship provided new experiences and inspired future works by Krasiński.

Adam Mickiewicz

On 11 August 1830 Krasiński met Adam Mickiewicz, a principal figure in Polish Romanticism, widely regarded as Poland's greatest poet. Krasiński's wide-ranging conversations with Mickiewicz, who dazzled Krasiński with the breadth of his knowledge, were vital in shaping Krasiński's literary techniques. From 14 August to 1 September 1830 they traveled together to the High Alps; Krasiński described this in his diary and wrote of the trip in a 5 September 1830 letter to his father.

Around early November 1830 Krasiński left Geneva and traveled to Italy, visiting Milan, Florence, and Rome. In Rome, receiving news about the outbreak of the November Uprising in Poland, he broke off his trip and returned to Geneva. He had been finishing a historical novel, Agaj-Han, considered his most significant work of that period. On the advice of his father, who opposed rebellion against the Russian Empire (he had become a Russian general), he did not go to Poland to participate in the Uprising – to his later everlasting regret. In May 1832 he set out for Poland, on the way again visiting Italy (Milan, Verona, Vicenza, Padua, Venice), then Innsbruck and Vienna, finally by mid-August 1832 arriving in Warsaw.

Having reunited with his father shortly afterward, they traveled together to Saint Petersburg, where he received an audience with the Russian Tsar. The elder Krasiński tried to arrange a diplomatic career for his son with the Russian Empire, but Zygmunt was not interested and was content to travel abroad again. In March 1833 he left Saint Petersburg and, visiting Warsaw and Kraków, traveled once more to Italy, where he would stay until 19 April 1834. This period saw the creation of what is likely his most famous work, the drama Nie-Boska komedia (The Undivine Comedy), written probably between summer and fall 1834. Like many of his works, it was published anonymously, to protect his family from possible repercussions in the Russian Empire, as his works were often outspoken and contained thinly veiled references to current politics.

In Rome Krasiński fell in love with Joanna Bobrowa. Though the relationship lasted for a few years, it did not result in marriage (in any case, Bobrowa was already married). With her and her husband Teodor, in the spring of 1834, Krasiński took another trip to Italy. That summer he met his father in Kissingen, then traveled to Wiesbaden and Ems. Autumn saw him visit Frankfurt and Milan, and by November he returned to Rome. In spring the following year he visited Naples, Pompeii, Sorrento, then Florence. In this period he finished another major work, the drama Irydion, which he had begun earlier, around 1832 or 1833.

Juliusz Słowacki

Departing Florence in June 1835, he met Bobrowa in Kissingen, then traveled with her to Ischl and Trieste, and then on alone to Vienna, which he reached in January 1836. Then he went to Milan and Florence, and again to Rome. In Rome, in May that year, he would meet and befriend another major Polish literary figure, Juliusz Słowacki. In summer 1836 he returned to Kissingen and visited Grafenberg, where he once more met his father. In November he returned to Vienna, where he stayed until June 1837.  That summer he visited Kissingen and Frankuft auf Men, then returned by September to Vienna.

Worsening health prevented him from resuming his travels until May 1838, when he traveled to Olomouc and Salzbrunn, then returned to Poland, in June visiting family estates in Opinogóra Górna. Shortly after, he traveled to Warsaw and then Gdańsk. September marked the end of his romance (which his father had opposed) with Joanna Bobrowa. On 1 September 1838, together with his father, he again departed for Italy (Venice, Florence, Rome, and Naples). In Rome he once again met Juliusz Słowacki.

Delfina Potocka, 1839

Krasiński's muse for many years was Countess Delfina Potocka (likewise a friend of composer Frédéric Chopin), with whom he conducted a romance from 1838 to 1848. In the first half of 1839 he traveled to Sicily, meeting Potocka in Switzerland, and his father in Dresden. He spent much of that time traveling with Potocka and writing poems and other works dedicated to her. In July 1840 his father informed the 28-year-old of plans that he had made for Zygmunt to marry Countess Eliza Branicka (1820–1876). The marriage eventuated on 26 July 1843 in Dresden. The couple would have four children: sons Władysław and Zygmunt, and daughters Maria Beatrix and Elżbieta.

As usual, much of Krasiński's time was divided between traveling and writing. The year 1843 also saw the publication of his poem "Przedświt" ("Predawn").

Krasiński, 1850

Posthumous photo, 1859

In 1845 he published another major work, Psalmy przyszłości (Psalms of the Future). Tirelessly continuing his travels through Central Europe, in January 1848, in Rome he met another Polish literary figure, the struggling poet Cyprian Norwid (sometimes considered a fourth Polish bard), whom he would aid financially. He also met Mickiewicz again, and endorsed the political faction of Prince Adam Jerzy Czartoryski. Krasiński was critical of the revolutionary Spring of Nations. In 1850 his health worsened, but that did not stop his constant travels, including to France. Through letters and audiences with European figures, including Napoleon III, whom he met in 1857 and 1858, he sought to gain support for the Polish cause. In 1856, in Paris, he took part in the funeral of Adam Mickiewicz. On 24 November 1857, in a major blow to Krasiński, his father died.

Krasiński himself shortly died, in Paris, on 23 February 1859. His body, like his father's, was transported to Poland and laid to rest in the family crypt at Opinogóra. Today the former family estate of the Krasiński family is the site of a Museum of Romanticism.

Works

Krasiński is best known for his philosophical Messianist ideas and tragic dramas. Other key elements found in his writings are the necessity of sacrifice and suffering for moral progress, as well as providentialism. His relation with his father, who strongly influenced, if not outright controlled, many aspects of his life, is also recognized as a major influence on his works.

His early works, particular those in the form of historical novels, like his Agaj-Han which describes the story of Marina Mniszech, have been influenced by the style of Walter Scott and Lord Byron. Many of his early works praised the concept of medieval chivalry. Out of those, Agaj-Han is the most notable, and its originality has secured its place in the history of Polish prose.

His most famous work is the drama Nie-boska komedia. Already in the 19th century, Mickiewicz discussed the work in his courses at the Collège de France, calling it the "highest achievement of the Slavic theater". A century later, Polish writer and Nobel Prize in Literature laureate Czesław Miłosz called this work "truly pioneering" and "undoubtedly a masterpiece not only of Polish but also of world literature", and notes that it is uprising such an brilliant work was created by an author who was barely out of his teens. Krasiński's work effectively discussed the concept of class struggle before Karl Marx coined the term. The work is likely the result of his thoughts about the Polish November Uprising and the contemporary French July Revolution of 1830. Its themes are the topics of social revolution and the destruction of the noble class, coupled with his study of the changes wrought by the emerging capitalism to the Western Europe, as well as . It is critical both of the weak and cowardly aristocracy, whose destruction it prophesized, but also of the revolution, which he portrayed as a destructive force. The work is also tackling the topics of the identify of a poet, the nature of poetry, and myths of romantic ideals such as perfect love, fame and happiness.

In Irydion, written in prose just like the Nie-boska komedia, the theme is once again the decay of the society. Krasiński criticized the excesses of fight for freedom and revenge, arguing that they such motivations do not fit within the Christian ethic; however many contemporaries saw it as his endorsement of the militant struggle for the Polish independence, rather then his support of the concepts such as organic work, which was his intention. His later works showed his opposition to the romantic, militant adventures, and his support for the more peaceful educational organic work, more clearly; this was particularly visible in the Psals of the Future, where he openly criticized the concept of revolution. Irydion was started before the Nie-boska komedia, but published after it, and Miłosz notes that while it is a work of considerable talent, especially in its perspicacious analysis of the decadence of Rome", it is inferior to the Komedia.

His more mature work is a body of poetry, also his lyrical works are not considered to be particularly significant; in fact Krasiński himself commented that he is not a very gifted poet. More memorable have been hs de facto "treatises on the philosophy of history" (most notably, The Dawn and Psalms of the Future), visibly influenced by thought of philosophers like Hegel, Schelling, Cieszkowski or Trentowski. His rejection of the romantic ideals and democratic slogans that in his view led to the unnecessary, bloody rebellions led to the polemic reply from Słowacki, in the form of the poem Odpowiedź na Psalmy przyszłości (A reply to the Psalms of the Future).

Krasiński was also a prolific writer of letters, some of which survive and have been published posthumously.

Polish literary scholar Zbigniew Sudolski, in his Polish Biographical Dictionary biography of Krasiński, notes that Krasiński has traditionally been ranked with Mickiewicz and Słowacki as one of Poland's Three National Bards. Of the three, however, Krasiński is considered the least influential. Czesław Miłosz writes that Krasiński, a popular mid-19th-century poet, remains an important figure in the history of Polish literature but does not rank equally with Słowacki or Mickiewicz.

Gallery

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  Count Krasiński's family coat-of-arms
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  Krasiński's wife Eliza, née Branicka, and children, by Franz Xaver Winterhalter, 1853
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  Church crypt in Opinogóra Górna, Poland: graves of Krasiński's family and parents

External links

• Media related to Zygmunt Krasiński at Wikimedia Commons
• Quotations related to Zygmunt Krasiński at Wikiquote
• (in Polish) Biography at poezja.org
• "Krasinski, Sigismund" . Collier's New Encyclopedia. 1921.
• Works by Zygmunt Krasiński at Project Gutenberg
• Works by or about Zygmunt Krasiński at the Internet Archive