Schulzian Inspirations and the Myth of Multiculturalism in Drohobych Auto(thanato)graphies

Abstract

The article attempts to draw attention to an almost unexplored context of the functioning of the works and biography of Bruno Schulz. The proposed study seeks to reconstruct this context, which consists of self-narratives of Holocaust survivors from Drohobych and Boryslav. These narratives emerged in the second half of the 1990s and at the beginning of the 2000s; they can be classified within the category of texts that Bartłomiej Krupa refers to as “late testimonies”. The analysis includes, among others, Drohobycz, Drohobycz (1997) by Henryk Grynberg, Koń Pana Boga (1999) by Wilhelm Dichter, Z Drohobycza do Ziemi Odzyskanej (1999) by Henryk Hoffman, and Pierwsza
noc u Szatana (2005) by Erwin Schenkelbach. These texts, diverse in terms of genre and drawing upon various literary conventions, nonetheless follow a reconstructable narrative pattern for coping with the traumatic experience of the Holocaust. The works are interpreted as extended auto(tanato)graphies, in which Schulz’s biography and textography serve as a distinctive cultural matrix. This
matrix facilitates, among other things, the processing of traumatic experiences and the consolidation
of identity through the practice of self-narration.