Hałyna Kruk: poems / 7
Adolf Bocheński: A Case For Cultural Decentralization / 12
An article by one of the most talented Polish political publicists of the interwar period, Adolf Bocheński (1909-1944), originally published in 1931, several years after Poland regained independence, in the Warsaw periodical „Droga” (Route). Drawing on concrete examples from the socio-cultural life of the Second Polish Republic, as well as the views of philosophers, sociologists, and historians, the author argues against the growing process of cultural centralization. In his view, this process leads to harmful uniformity, standardization, and the impoverishment of national culture. To counteract this tendency, Bocheński advocates, among other measures, supporting local centers in order to “preserve the distinct cultural physiognomy of individual regions.” Such efforts, he argues, would make Poland a country of “a wide range of ideas and cultural diversity,” thereby strengthening it and enhancing its attractiveness on the international stage.
Keywords: interwar period, cultural centralization and decentralization, cultural standardization, homogenization of culture, national culture, cultural policy, Lviv, center and periphery, regionalism, Ukrainian minority in the Second Polish Republic, Ukrainian culture
Kazimierz M. Ujazdowski:Reason of State and the Treasure of Diversity / 21
This essay offers a synthetic presentation of the life and intellectual profile of Adolf Bocheński (1909-1944) – a political writer and lawyer from a landed gentry family. He published his first major book while studying at the École des Sciences Politiques in Paris. After returning to Poland, he worked as a publicist and served as editor of the journals „Bunt Młodych” (The Revolt of the Young) and „Polityka” (Politics). His writings addressed, among other topics, international relations and Poland’s security. Following the outbreak of the Second World War, Bocheński joined the military and demonstrated exceptional courage, fighting in the September Campaign, in France, at Narvik, in Africa, and in Italy. He was killed on 18 July 1944 near Ancona while defusing a mine. In the latter part of the essay, the author focuses on Bocheński’s article O decentralizację kulturalną (A Case For Cultural Decentralization), reprinted in this issue of Akcent, and highlights the continued relevance of his vision of Poland as a culturally diverse country that supports the development of local centers independent of the Warsaw-based center.
Keywords: Adolf Bocheński, interwar period, political journalism, geopolitics, multiculturalism, cultural centralization and decentralization, homogenization of cultural patterns, Second World War, Jerzy Giedroyc, Paris “Culture”
Katarzyna Jaszczak: That Spark Which Gives Life / 26
The story is set in a Polish village at the turn of the 1940s and 1950s. It follows the life of Bernadeta Wieczorkówna, from her childhood to the moment when she has to choose her marital path. The relationships between the protagonist, her friend, and her fiancé unfold against the backdrop of historical events: the Second World War and the postwar “miracle” in the Lublin Archcathedral. The young characters experience personal tragedies whose meaning they struggle to comprehend. A wedding turns into a funeral, life and death continually intertwine, and the villagers face these events together – their decisions are deeply interconnected.
Marek Sołtysik: Lessons in the Art of Dying Well / 39
Tomasz Kłusek: From Ludwin Through “Twórczość” to the Stars / 44
An essay devoted to the prose writer Andrzej Łuczeńczyk (1945-1991). Born in Ludwin near Łęczna, he attended secondary school in Lublin in the early 1960s and obtained his final diploma in 1978. He later lived in Wieluń, where he worked as a construction laborer. After returning to Ludwin, he ran a family farm while also working as a boiler operator at a local health center. The article analyzes his literary output in the context of this unusual biography. During his lifetime, two collections of short stories and three short novels were published (one of them, Wyzwanie [The Challenge], only in the journal “Twórczość”). His complete works were published posthumously in Dzieła zebrane (Collected Works, 2018). His writing evolved from realist depictions of provincial life to fantastical, adventure-driven narratives of a parabolic nature. His prose was highly regarded by the eminent critic Henryk Bereza, who repeatedly wrote about it, and, in his funeral speech, compared Łuczeńczyk to Bolesław Leśmian and Józef Czechowicz, which sparked considerable controversy.
Keywords: Andrzej Łuczeńczyk, Polish prose, literary history, literary criticism, Henryk Bereza, “Twórczość”, Polish People’s Republic, small realism, fantasy, rural life, Lublin
Janika Läänemets:poems / 69
Jarosław Cymerman:Writing a Biography – Józef Czechowicz. Part 5: The Maternal Line / 72
The mother was one of the most important figures in Józef Czechowicz’s life, and her presence played a significant role in his work. Małgorzata Czechowicz, née Sułek, came from a peasant background in the Lublin region. A hardworking woman marked by hardship, she supported the family alone after her husband’s death. Her connections to folk traditions and to the legacy of uprisings (her grandfather, Kazimierz Sułek, is believed to have fought in the January Uprising) became an important source of inspiration for the poet. In Czechowicz’s poetry, the mother appears as an embodiment of tenderness, a symbol of security, and a bearer of “secret knowledge” that helps make sense of the world. This literary image is juxtaposed with testimonies of contemporaries confirming the authenticity of the bond between Czechowicz and his mother and emphasizing its profound influence on his worldview and poetic imagination.
Keywords: Józef Czechowicz, Małgorzata Czechowicz, biography, interwar Polish literature, poetry, maternal motif, folk culture, January Uprising, biographical myth, Józef Łobodowski, Lublin
Stanisław Zasada:There Is a Limit to Suffering / 82
This reportage centers on the well-known poem Walc (Waltz), written by Czesław Miłosz in occupied Warsaw. After the war, the poem was analyzed by Krystyna Papierkowska, a terminally ill student of Polish philology at the Catholic University of Lublin. After her death, her friend sent this analysis to Miłosz. In response, the poet wrote that “all of this forms a certain whole,” referring both to the fate of the characters in his poem and to the suffering marked upon Papierkowska’s short life. Several years ago, the publisher Adam Cedro, who had read Papierkowska’s work during his own studies, published the book Walc na troje (Waltz for Three), which includes the poem, her interpretation, correspondence between Miłosz and Paluchowska, and photographs from Miłosz’s visit to Lublin in 1981, when he received an honorary doctorate from the university.
Keywords: Czesław Miłosz, Waltz (poem), Lublin, Catholic University of Lublin, Krystyna Papierkowska, Danuta Paluchowska, Sachsenhausen, Second World War
Tadas Žvirinskis: poems / 89
Bogusław Bakuła:Vivisection or Therapy? Hungarian Reckoning Drama / 92
Contemporary Hungarian drama can be divided into four main currents: 1) reckoning drama, 2) drama addressing the consequences of systemic transformation, 3) family and social drama, and 4) quasi-postmodernist drama. These currents are shaped by three dominant perspectives: contestation of reality, (post)traumatic experience, and a transition into depression. Reckoning drama, closely tied to social, economic, and historical realities, presents Hungarian reality in an extremely pessimistic light, exposing the brutalities of Stalinism and the post-1956 period, the collapse of authority, violence, hypocrisy, and systemic injustice. In this atmosphere of suffering, existential evil emerges as a source of intergenerational trauma and deepening depression. Works by playwrights such as György Spiró, János Háy, Péter Nádas, Péter Kárpáti, Zoltán Egressy, Béla Pintér, István Tasnádi, Kornél Hamvai, and András Visky have gained an important place in Central European culture and have been both published and staged in Poland.
Keywords: contemporary Hungarian drama, Second World War, fascism, Holocaust, Stalinism, communism, Hungarian Revolution of 1956, reckoning drama, historical drama, emigration, systemic transformation, contestation, (post)trauma, depression, existential evil
Danuta Kűnstler-Langner: poems / 107
Mateusz Szuba: Stolarczyk / 111
The story is set in a village somewhere in the Pomeranian region in the early years of the twenty-first century. Its protagonist is the eponymous Tadeusz Stolarczyk, an unemployed man struggling with alcoholism. His addiction exacerbates a serious lung disease. Stolarczyk’s story serves as a lens through which to portray the problems affecting the Polish countryside during the period of systemic transformation: unemployment, addiction, violence (including domestic violence), poverty, loneliness, social exclusion, and indifference. An additional thread follows a social worker engaged in assisting those in need, while also depicting aspects of her family life. The narrative also offers episodic glimpses into the lives of children growing up in rural areas during this period.
Bogdan Nowicki: poems / 118
REVIEWS
Polish Jews…
Alfred Marek Wierzbicki: A Deeply Emotional Autobiography [Romuald Jakub Weksler-Waszkinel „Liść i drzewo. Powrót do wiary przodków” (The Leaf and the Tree. A Return to the Faith of The Ancestors)]; Sławomir Jacek Żurek: The Hasidic Commonwealth [Dorota Bidzińska „Republika pobożnych. Chasydzka historia Polski” (The Republic of the Pious. A Hasidic History of Poland)]; Andrzej Trzciński: The Power of Storytelling [„Opowieści chasydzkie. Antologia” (Hasidic Tales. An Anthology), edited by Wojciech Tworek, Marcin Wodziński]; Piotr Sewruk: The Labyrinth of Misery and the Machinery of Vice: On the Jewish Underworld of Old Lublin [Adam Kopciowski „Nieświęte miasto. Opowieść o szajce Kojech gejers i żydowskim półświatku dawnego Lublina” (Unholy City. The Story of the Kojech Gejers Gang and the Jewish Underworld of Old Lublin)] / 122
Reviews of recently published books addressing themes related to the history and culture of the Jewish community in Poland. The section discusses the autobiography of Romuald Jakub Weksler-Waszkinel, Dorota Bidzińska’s reportage tracing the routes of Polish Hasidim, an anthology of Hasidic tales edited by Wojciech Tworek and Marcin Wodziński and published in the prestigious “Biblioteka Narodowa” series, as well as Adam Kopciowski’s monograph devoted to the Kojech gejers gang operating in Lublin in the late nineteenth century.
Poets, Poets…
Jan Wolski: The Radiance of Grażyna Zambrzycka’s Poetry [Grażyna Zambrzycka „Blask. Wybór wierszy i poematów z lat 1993–2023” (Radiance. Selected Poems and Long Poems from 1993–2023)]; Bartosz Suwiński: “A Procedure on the Open Trauma of Reality” [Dominik Żyburtowicz „Ośrodek Poezji Społecznej” (The Centre of Social Poetry)]; Anna Łyczewska: A Legendary Tourist, a Slave of Hope, and a Master of Desire [Artur Skowron „Słowa i obrazy” (Words and Images)]; Józef Franciszek Fert: How to Use Poetic Panaceas? [Magdalena Jankowska „Ledum”]; Stefan Jurkowski: Lublin and Other Worlds [Anna Łyczewska „przed chwilą” (just a moment ago)]; Jerzy Grupiński: “Those Who Dwell on Mount Carmel”) [Krzysztof Kuczkowski „Głosolalia” (Glossolalia)] / 140
Discussions of the latest poetry collections written by literary scholars and critics. They offer detailed analyses and outline the most prominent contemporary literary currents and phenomena.
ART
Edyta Frelik: The Metaphysics of the City and the Body in the Artistic Explorations of Tadeusz Mysłowski / 158
Tadeusz Mysłowski can be seen as an artist-researcher whose work, even though created decades ago, anticipates ideas central to contemporary science and philosophy. Intuitively sensitive to patterns, structures, and processes, he engages with materials ranging from scientific and popular-science sources to seemingly random textual, visual, or conceptual fragments, allowing them to interact, generating coherent trajectories through artistic transformation. As such, Mysłowski functions as a mediator, translating across knowledge domains, human and non-human actors, and cultural contexts. His visual works often evoke scientific models – fractal geometries, RNA-DNA structures, phylogenetic trees, or cosmological maps – while preserving the intuitive logic of artistic imagination. By merging empirical and aesthetic modes, his practice anticipates conceptual shifts in contemporary thought and demonstrates art’s epistemological potential: generating understanding and insight through the translation and transformation of heterogeneous elements into cohesive, revealing visual forms.
Keywords: Tadeusz Mysłowski, artist’s book, New York-Lublin (spatial dualism), collage / visual-textual montage, organic geometry, fractal geometry, modernism and postmodernism, art-science relations, collecting, cultural translation
THEATRE
Magdalena Jankowska:Such-As-They-Are? / 177
Betlejem polskie (Polish Bethleem) by Lucjan Rydel, directed by Rafał Szumski and staged at the end of last year, marks the second production of this play at the Juliusz Osterwa Theatre in Lublin (the first was directed by Andrzej Rozhin in 1981). A comparison of these two productions reveals the influence of the socio-political contexts of 1981 and 2025. The earlier allusive expectations of systemic change have been replaced by concerns about rebuilding national community and expressing solidarity with the victims of war. Song, dance, and light create a dynamic spectacle that weaves together the folk tradition of nativity plays with elements of modernity. Beneath its colorful surface, however, lies a darker layer, exposing troubling aspects of Polish mentality – mutual hostility, antisemitism, and homophobia. Yet the moving, lyrical finale restores hope for overcoming these weaknesses.
Keywords: nativity play, folk tradition, socio-political context, hope
PROFILES
Jan Wolski: Marek Kusiba – Journalist and Poet / 182
The text presents the creative profile of the émigré writer Marek Kusiba, who has lived in Canada since 1984. The author emphasizes the interplay of journalistic and poetic elements in Kusiba’s work, evident both in his columns and in his lyrical writing. As a result, his poetry often incorporates features characteristic of journalistic texts, while his journalistic forms frequently approach poetry in tone and structure. The analysis draws on selected columns, recorded interviews, poetry collections, and autobiographical reflections, demonstrating how these two modes of expression intersect and enrich one another.
Keywords: Marek Kusiba, poetry, journalism, column writing, existential themes, Lublin, emigration, Canada, Polish diaspora
MEMOIRS
Dobrosław Bagiński: The Imagia of the Image / 191
A commemorative text devoted to Professor Piotr Francuz, who passed away in 2020 – a scholar of social sciences, head of the Department of Experimental Psychology, and, after 2012, director of the Institute of Psychology at the Catholic University of Lublin. Written by his long-time friend, Professor Dobrosław Bagiński, the article recalls the circumstances of their first meeting, outlines the key themes of Francuz’s research, and summarizes the main theses of his most important book, IMAGIA (2014). Both scholars were united primarily by their interest in mental imagery, the foundations of visuality, and new media. Francuz advocated, among other things, the study of communicative structures as constructs of the mind which continuously adapts human behavior to environmental conditions. A distinctive feature of his work was the use of artworks as analytical material, based on the conviction that artists of earlier periods intuitively discovered and employed key psychophysiological mechanisms of perception.
Keywords: Piotr Francuz, cognitive psychology, visual perception mechanisms, visual grammar, word-based vs. image-based civilization, new media, visual arts, Catholic University of Lublin
POSTCARDS FROM THE ISLAND
Grażyna Lutosławska: Grantchester / 195
CANADIAN NOTEBOOK
Marek Kusiba: “Don’t You Intend to Pass into Eternity?” or the Publisher as Savior / 199
FILM TASTINGS
Jacek Dąbała: Paranormally Close to Reality / 203
FAREWELL
Wiesław Myśliwski (1932-2026) / 204
Notes about the authors / 206
