31 January 1938, Monday

Warsaw. Wanda Kragen writes a letter to Bruno Schulz, describing the echoes of her utterance during the discussion on Ferdydurke.

Kragen* replies to Schulz’s letter, in which he thanked her for her goodwill and enthusiasm, with which she received his talk on Ferdydurke1. Kragen negatively assesses her talk, disagreeing with Schulz, who was impressed with her courage: “why appear present at all, why even take part, why have the courage which you value?”2. Kragen enumerates the annoyances that she suffered: her friends leaving early, the commentary by Rafał Blüth*, whom she values, and a crushing assessment of her talk in the weekly Czas3. Her letter, in a catastrophic tone – “I do not doubt that my talk will return with a vengeance many times”4 – exerts an impression on Schulz, who is not a foreigner to depression and melancholia: “I fear if the whole Ferdydurke affair does not become a psychological trauma for her”5.

At the same time, Kragen sustains her negative opinion about Gombrowicz’s novel, criticising the comparison to Proust6. She recommends to Schulz Stanisław Piasecki’s article7, with which she fully agrees8. In a letter to Romana Halpern Schulz assesses this article unequivocally as “crude and stupid”9. 

Wanda Kragen’s letter could erase the positive impression that she exerted on Schulz during her talk in the Polish Writers’ Union*. It is not known whether he ever decided to reply since on 21 February he informed Romana Halpern that he had not responded to the letter yet10. (ts) (transl. ms)

 

See also: 11 January 1938*, 18 January 1938*. 

  • 1
    Bruno Schulz’s letters to Romana Halpern from 18 January 1938 and 23 January 1938, [in:] Bruno Schulz, Księga listów, compiled and edited by Jerzy Ficowski, revised by Stanisław Danecki, Gdańsk 2016.
  • 2
    Wanda Kragen’s letter to Bruno Schulz from 31 January 1938, [in:] Bruno Schulz, op. cit.
  • 3
    See “To nie była dyskusja lecz demonstracja”, Czas, 19 January 1938, no. 18, y. 90.
  • 4
    Wanda Kragen’s letter to Bruno Schulz from 31 January 1938…
  • 5
    Bruno Schulz’s letter to Romana Halpern from 6 February 1938, [in:] Bruno Schulz, op. cit.
  • 6
    Schulz compared Gombrowicz to Proust in a letter to Romana Halpern from 16 November 1938 (see Bruno Schulz’s letter to Romana Halpern from 16 November 1938, [in:] Bruno Schulz, op. cit.). Probably he used the same comparison in the lost letter to Wanda Kragen.
  • 7
    Stanisław Piasecki, “Czarowanie gałązką w zębach”, Prosto z Mostu, 30 January 1938, no. 7 (173), r. IV – in this article the author criticises not only Ferdydurke and Gombrowicz, but also Schulz, whose enthusiastic talk in the Polish Writers’ Union he sees as a sign of psychosis.
  • 8
    “Podpisuje oburącz”, see Wanda Kragen’s letter to Bruno Schulz from 31 January 1938…
  • 9
    Bruno Schulz’s letter to Romana Halpern from 21 February 1938, [in:] Bruno Schulz, op. cit.
  • 10
    Ibidem, p. 167.