"The Strangeness of Existence". Leonia Jabłonkówna’s Reading of Witkacy

Abstract

The article presents the profile of Leonia Jabłonkówna, theater director and critic. She lived in the years 1905–1987. She graduated in Polish Philology from the University of Warsaw (1927) and in Directing from the National Academy of Dramatic Art in Warsaw (1939). After the war, she was directing and, in the years 1956–1976, she was part of the team of the “Theatre”, a monthly journal devoted to contemporary theatre. She published around 300 texts there, some on the staging of plays by Witkacy, including The Mother, They, The Anonymous Work: Four Acts of a Rather Nasty Nightmare, Dainty Shapes and Hairy Apes, and Metaphysics of a Two-Headed Calf. The article discusses the texts dedicated to Witkacy, demonstrating Jabłonkówna’s insightful and innovative reading of the writer’s work, as well as her extraordinary ability to describe the performances themselves and to analyse the staging and acting. Despite the brilliance and independence of her views, the respect of the theatrical community, and her vast journalistic output, the one of the most important columnists in Polish criticism was until recently almost completely forgotten.