I Poetiken definierar Aristoteles peripeti som en diskontinuitet i fabeln, manifesterad som en motsats mellan en gestalts intenderade och realiserade ändamål. Kategorin har sin grund i den aristoteliska synen på mänskligt handlande, som upphöjer förnuftet till människans intentionella centrum och som förklarar hennes felsteg med förnuftets begränsningar. Föredraget ställer frågan hur peripetin påverkas då den skrivs in i en text som bygger på augustinsk-luthersk antropologi, som så radikalt skiljer sig från antikt tänkande. I denna antropologi utgörs i stället människans intentionella centrum av viljan, som åtnjuter autonomi gentemot förnuftet, är oföränderligt korrupt och kan manipulera förnuftets avsikter. Föredraget försöker besvara frågan genom att undersöka vad som händer med peripetikategorin hos en av den svenska 1900-talslitteraturens mest lutherska författare: katoliken Birgitta Trotzig.

Birgitta Trotzig (1929–2011), one of Sweden’s most influential modernist writers, characterizedherself as a religious author. Investigating her autobiographical comments in interviews,essays, radio programmes etc., the article attempts to reconstruct her own fundamental theology.Swedish literary scholars usually define Trotzig’s religiosity as a kind of mysticism. Thisarticle argues, however, that her attitude towards faith was remarkably rational. As reflectedin the analysed material, her personal creed evolved following a sequence of five intellectualchoices. First, Trotzig dissociated herself from atheism and agnosticism, choosing to liveas a believer. Secondly, she rejected all religions worshipping non-personal beings and choseChristianity and its faith in a personal God. She then repudiated Protestantism and the Churchof Sweden and chose the old churches because of their rich theological and liturgical tradition.Fourth, she distanced herself from certain aspects of Orthodox spirituality and chose RomanCatholicism as her confession. In the fifth and final step, she renounced the official, conservativeCatholic dogmatism and chose the progressive, left-leaning Catholic movements, closelyconnected to the new Catholic French theology, la nouvelle théologie. The article thoroughlyelucidates the rational arguments formulated by Trotzig to justify her five religious choices.

The article discusses the consecration of foreign literature in a national context. Studying the presence of Scandinavian literature in two kinds of ennobling Polish source material – classics lists, published in five encyclopedias (1959, 1962, 1970, 1974, 1995), and the classics series Biblioteka Narodowa (National Library, started 1919 and still running) – it observes that some of the consecrating mechanisms, for instance politization and the tendency to open up canon, are common to the consecration of both national literature and foreign works. In most respects, however, the consecration of foreign texts clearly diverges from the canonization of national literature: it is based on porous principles, it lacks strong institutional foundation, it largely rests on aesthetic judgements formulated within core cultures, it privileges contemporary authors, it is marked by remarkable lability, it emphasizes universal ideas, it is fascinated by the Otherness. The consecration of Scandinavian works in the analyzed Polish source material, the article concludes, corresponds relatively weakly to the power-oriented notion of canonization, normally applied to national canon formations, and can be better described by the notion of world literature, as defined within the German comparative tradition.

This article has two aims. Firstly, it makes an attempt to shed new light onthe representation of sickness in Birgitta Trotzig’s (1929–2011) writings.Secondly, the article, by using its analyses of Trotzig, tries to draw sometheoretical conclusions concerning the possibilities of applying a theology ofpathology in literary studies. While earlier scholars have interpretedTrotzig’s depiction of sickness by means of secular intertexts, the startingpoint of this article is Trotzig’s adopting of Christian anthropology as heruntranscendable hermeneutic horizon. Thus, it is argued, sickness in herwritings should primarily be related to theological contexts. By close readingof a representative text passage, the opening scene of Trotzig’s best knownnovel Dykungens dotter (The Marsh King’s Daughter, 1985), the articleexplores which contexts within Christian theology of sickness that would bespecially fertile for an interpretation of her sickness discourse. The analysesreveal four theological notions of sickness as intertextually present inTrotzig’s narration: Augustine’s concupiscence, Sören Kierkegaard’sdispair, Pierre Teilhard de Chardin’s decomposition, and EugenDrewermann’s neurosis. The main theoretical conclusions of the analysesare: (a) that the theological notions of sickness to a high degree differ froma ”natural” experience as well as from the biblical sources, (b) that thesenotions can contradict each other and generate conceptual conflicts, and (c)that the notions therefore, when applied in literary studies, demand stronghermeneutic control.

This article presents the research project “Searching for a New National Identity: TheConstruction of Swedish Cultural Memory in Carl Snoilsky’s Poems Svenska bilder”, and functions as an introduction to the four subsequent articles in this issue of Studia Litteraria, whichare the result of the project. The principal aim of the project was a comprehensive analysis ofthe construction of cultural memory in Carl Snoilsky’s cycle of poems Svenska bilder (SwedishPictures) for many decades being part of the core canon of Swedish literature, but which remainslargely forgotten today. In part one, the article outlines the complex process of the creation andpublication of Svenska bilder. It also reviews the state of research on Snoilsky’s cycle, justifyingthe need for new theoretical perspectives. In part two, the article analyses ways in which nationalmemory is portrayed in Svenska bilder at different intra- and extranarrative levels, arguing thatcultural memory and its preservation are among the central themes of the cycle. In part three,the article illuminates the construction of cultural memory in Svenska bilder as an example ofnineteenth-century European cultural memory. The article considers three features, typical ofnineteenth-century collective memory culture, to be particularly important for Snoilsky’s poems:subjectivisation, historicisation, and nationalisation. In part four, the article discusses Svenskabilder as an attempt to democratise the model of Swedish national memory created by the Romantics. The article argues that the cultural memory in Svenska bilder in many ways reflects the liberal ideas of the second half of the nineteenth century advocated by Snoilsky. In part five,the article examines the place of Polishness in the construction of Swedish cultural memory inSvenska bilder. Although Snoilsky considered himself a friend of Poland and an advocate forthe Polish independence movements, in his cycle he assigns Polishness the role of the negativeOther that serves to consolidate a positively characterised Swedish national identity. The articleconcludes with a short presentation of the four articles that are the fruits of the presented project.

 Artykuł jest prezentacją projektu naukowego „Searching for a New National Identity: The Construction of Swedish Cultural Memory in Carl Snoilsky’s Poems Svenska bilder”i pełni funkcję wprowadzenia do czterech kolejnych artykułów niniejszego numeru czasopisma Studia Litteraria, będących rezultatem projektu. Głównym celem prezentowanego projektubyła wszechstronna analiza konstrukcji pamięci kulturowej w cyklu wierszy Svenska bilder(Szwedzkie obrazy) Carla Snoilsky’ego, zaliczanego przez wiele dziesięcioleci do ścisłego kanonu literatury szwedzkiej, a dziś w dużym stopniu zapomnianego. W części pierwszej artykułprzedstawia skomplikowany proces powstawania i publikacji Svenska bilder. Dokonuje takżeprzeglądu stanu badań nad cyklem Snoilsky’ego, motywując potrzebę nowych perspektyw teoretycznych. W części drugiej artykuł analizuje sposoby ukazania pamięci narodowej w Svenskabilder na różnych poziomach intra- i ekstranarracyjnych, dowodząc, że pamięć kulturowa i jejprzechowywanie należą do centralnych tematów cyklu. W części trzeciej artykuł naświetlakonstrukcję pamięci kulturowej w Svenska bilder jako przykład XIX-wiecznej europejskiejpamięci kulturowej. Za szczególnie ważne dla wierszy Snoilsky’ego artykuł uznaje trzy cechy,typowe dla XIX-wiecznej kultury pamięci zbiorowej: subiektywizację, historyzację i nacjonalizację. W części czwartej artykuł omawia Svenska bilder jako próbę demokratyzacji stworzonego przez romantyków wzorca szwedzkiej pamięci narodowej. Artykuł dowodzi, że pamięć kulturowa w Svenska bilder pod wieloma względami odzwierciedla liberalne idee drugiejpołowy XIX wieku, których Snoilsky był zwolennikiem. W części piątej artykuł bada miejscepolskości w konstrukcji szwedzkiej pamięci kulturowej w Svenska bilder. Mimo że Snoilskyuważał się za przyjaciela Polski i orędownika polskich ruchów niepodległościowych, w swymcyklu przydzielił polskości rolę negatywnego Innego, służącego do konsolidacji pozytywnienacechowanej szwedzkiej tożsamości narodowej. Tekst kończy krótka prezentacja czterech artykułów, będących owocami prezentowanego projektu.

Cultural Memory Disenchanted? Secularization and Re-sacralization in Carl Snoilsky’s Svenska bilder (1872-1897)

This article investigates the patterns of secularization and re-sacralization in Carl Snoilsky’s (1841–1903) collection of poems Svenska bilder (1872–1897, Swedish Pictures[KB1]  Images), ranked for a long time as a Swedish classic. The collection turns back to significant events in early modern Swedish history and has been conceived of as a compendium of national cultural memory. As a dedicated adherent of the century’s progressive liberal and democratic ideology, Snoilsky, the article shows, secularizes the historical material of the poems in accordance with four main patterns: autonomization, specialization, depotentiation, and differentiation. However, for the purpose of emphasizing Swedish patriotic values, Snoilsky simultaneously accomplishes a re-sacralization of the collection’s cultural memory by means of some recurrent patterns: ontologization, existentialization, mythization, actualization, etc.