LanguagesThe Sonnet, The Sequence, The Qasidah

7/29/2019 LanguagesThe Sonnet, The Sequence, The Qasidah

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American Association of Teachers of Slavic and East European Languages

The Sonnet, the Sequence, the Qasidah: East-West Dialogue in Adam Mickiewicz's SonnetsAuthor(s): Izabela KalinowskaReviewed work(s):Source: The Slavic and East European Journal, Vol. 45, No. 4 (Winter, 2001), pp. 641-659Published by: American Association of Teachers of Slavic and East European LanguagesStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3086126 .Accessed: 05/05/2012 06:58

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THE SONNET,THE SEQUENCE,THE QASIDAH:EAST-WESTDIALOGUE INADAM MICKIEWICZ'SONNETS.Izabela Kalinowska, SUNY Stony Brook

I strainmyeyes andmy sightreachesso far andso widethat it embracesmore thanthe frameofthe horizon. -A. Mickiewicz,"Farys."

The involuntary traveler is not always an enthusiastic tourist. Political ex-iles who focus on the causes of their displacement and on the losses theyhave suffered in the process often show little interest in their new surround-ings. Fortunately, nostalgic dejection did not stifle the creativity of AdamMickiewicz, one of Poland's most celebrated exiles. Nor did it determinethe mood of the poetry written during the first phase of his life in exile.During the time he spent in the south of the Russian empire, Mickiewicz,like Farys, the hero of one of his "Russian" poems, looked far and wide,and his creative genius allowed him to continue to reach beyond the hori-zons of Polish literature. This essay investigates the multifaceted characterof Mickiewicz's dialogue with what his contemporaries would have termedOriental cultural traditions. This took place in two poetic cycles publishedin 1826 under the common title The Sonnets. The poet's biography, TheSonnets' critical reception, and the history of the sonnet as a genre form abackground for the analysis of the volume's inner dynamic, and, ultimately,its intriguing fusion of eastern and western literary traditions.Intertextually rich, The Sonnets engage both the long tradition of Euro-pean sonnet-writing and all the major intellectual currents that shapedmodern Europe. But the tapestry of intertextual influences in this poeticsequence reaches beyond Europe. Not just the superficial and, for the mostpart, mediated "Oriental" borrowings in vocabulary and imagery point inthis direction. More significant is the fact that The Sonnets' narrative struc-ture shares common characteristics with the qasidah of classical Arabicliterature, a longer poem, or "a series of pictures conveying different as-pects of Arabian life, loosely bound together in a conventional order," inwhich a description of a journey and the development of the poem's propersubject follow the opening lines, commemorating the beloved (Gibb 18).SEEJ, Vol. 45, No. 4 (2001): p. 641-p. 659 641


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642 Slavicand EastEuropeanJournalThus the concept of an "Oriental travelogue" assumes a new meaning whenused in reference to Mickiewicz's sonnet sequence. The Sonnets do notaffirm Europe's dominance and its superiority over the cultures of theEast; rather, they survey and illustrate the benefits of the creative engage-ment that can result from literary travel in both the literal and figurativesense.

The Beginning of the JourneyA few elements of the poet's biography form a necessary context for TheSonnets' interpretation. In 1824, due to their previous involvement with anorganization promoting scholarship and self-reliance among the students ofthe university in Vilnius, Mickiewicz and a group of his former schoolmatesbecame suspect in the eyes of the tsarist authorities. They were incarcer-ated, and later ordered to leave Lithuania and to settle in one of the non-Polish areas of the Russian empire. In the fall of the same year, the poetarrived in St. Petersburg. From there he continued to Odessa, where hehad been assigned a post as a teacher. Mickiewicz reached this port city inFebruary of 1825. Even though he never assumed his teaching duties,Mickiewicz developed friendly relations with Odessa's high society, whichthen included people of many national backgrounds. In spite of the atmo-sphere of scandal that surrounded her already in Odessa, Karolina Sobain-ska, nee Rzewuska, the daughter of a Polish aristocratic family, had grace-fully assumed a central position in that society. In Sobaniska'smiscellany,just a couple of pages from Aleksandr Pushkin's "Chto v imeni. .. ,"Mickiewicz, in a hand equally as fine as the Russian poet's, recorded:

Niedbamco sie naziemi,co w niebiosachdzieje,w tobie widzilbym ylko moja przysziadolew tobieztozytbymduszy rozum wole,Pamiatkinawet sercagtebokozagrzebie,Abym nigdy nic nieczut oddzielnie od ciebie.1(I care not whathappenson earth,or in the heavens,I want to see my future existence in you,I want to cede to you my soul's reason and will,I will deeply bury even my heart's memoriesIn order not to feel anything apart from you.)

Around the end of August 1825, Mickiewicz set off on a trip to theCrimea. According to Wiadystaw Mickiewicz, the poet's son and one of hisfirst biographers, Karolina Sobaniska suggested the trip (31). The partici-pants in the Crimean trip were an intriguing, if somewhat peculiar, collec-tion of characters. Apart from Sobaniska, who was later revealed to be acollaborator of the tsar's secret police, her husband, and her brother, thepolitically conservative writer Henryk Rzewuski, the group consisted of


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The Sonnet,the Sequence,the Qasidah 643General Witt, Sobaniska's lover and the chief of the tsar's police in thesouthern provinces, a police informant named Boshniak, and a certainKatusowski, an administrator of the Sobaniskiestate. After crossing the seato Sevastopol, the Sobaniskis and Witt established themselves in Evpatoria.Rzewuski and Katusowski occasionally accompanied Mickiewicz during hisexcursions to various places in the Crimea. At other times, Mickiewicz onlyhad the Sobaniskis' Cossack or a Tatar guide as a companion (W.Mickiewicz 208-213).In December 1826, in Moscow, Mickiewicz published his first volume ofpoetry written in exile and entitled simply The Sonnets of Adam Mickie-wicz. The edition contained two cycles of poems -a sequence of twenty-two love sonnets usually referred to as the Odessa sonnets, and eighteensonnets bearing the title "The Crimean Sonnets." On the volume's titlepage the poet included a quotation from Petrarch: "Quand' era in partealtr' uom da quel, ch'io sono" - "when I was partly a different man than Iam now." An epigraph from Goethe's West-Oestlicher Divan ("Wer denDichter will verstehen, muss in Dichters Lande gehen" - "If one wants tounderstand a poet one must venture into the poet's land") preceded "TheCrimean Sonnets." Even though Sobanska, the poet's lover and the femmefatale of Odessa society, was by many perceived to be the implicit dedicateeof at least some of the Odessa sonnets, it is the Crimean cycle which bearsan explicit dedication: "to the companions of the Crimean journey." In-cluded in the first edition was also a Persian translation of one of thesonnets authored by Mirza Djafar Topqy-Ba?a.2The Sonnets' publication unleashed one of the most heated literary de-bates in the history of nineteenth-century Polish literature prior to the anti-Russian uprising of November 1830. Most reviewers interpreted the Son-nets as a very powerful statement in an ongoing debate concerning theconcept and form of Polish national literature. At stake were some of theissues that still make the Sonnets such a fascinating object of analysis, i.e.,the character and extent of the poet's reliance on models and materialperceived by the critics as foreign.Maurycy Mochnacki, one of the heralds of romanticism in Poland, wel-comed The Sonnets as a most significant cultural event, noting thatthe combinationof the boldest and most colorful eastern maginationwith the melancholyloftinessof the northern omantics,heblendingof the soundsof southernArabicpoetrywiththedark,sentimental ensitivity f today'spoets;finally, hemoldingof a complex otalityoutof the spiritof the forgottenmastersof modernEuropeancivilizationand its thoughtfulidealism-all of this characterizeshe generaleffect on the reader'smindproducedby thecontemplation f this mostuncommonwork,thissingularpoeticcreation.(Billip83)It was precisely The Sonnets' mixture of Orientalism and European idealismwhich so impressed Mochnacki and provoked severe criticism from otherreviewers. Indeed, The Sonnets and their author became the objects of


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644 Slavicand EastEuropeanJournalridiculeand often angryattacks launchedby the more conservativemem-bersof the Warsawiteraryworld.In the opinionof KajetanKozmian,forexample,Mickiewiczhad moved too farin the directionof the unfamiliar.TheSonnets' mageryandlanguagecontainedelementswhichhe consideredalien andthus a possiblethreat to Polish nationalculture(Billip334-342).

Why the Sonnet?FranciszekSalezyDmochowski,anotherinfluential igureon the Polishliterary cene of the time, focusedhis criticismon Mickiewicz's hoice of thesonnet.Dmochowskicharacterizedhe sonnet as a formthat does not facili-tate a free and accurateexpressionof feeling. Implying he answer n thequestion'sformulation,he wondered whetherthe poet's inspirationcouldwithstand he limitsof the sonnet'srigid orm.He argued hat evenin Italianpoetrythe sonnetrarelycaptured he voice of the heart,and was insteadanexpressionof flirtationand wit. The formof the sonnet overshadowed tssubject,andonly those sonnetswhichwere "light,smoothlywritten,witty,and harmonious n their choice of words,rhymes,and the compositionofthe stanzas" could be successful(Billip 72). Accordingto Dmochowski,Mickiewicz's onnets were lackingin most of these areas. Withrespecttothe "CrimeanSonnets,"the same critic claimed that he was surprised hatMickiewicz would try to contain "a subject that is so rich, so new andfresh . . . in the narrow, uncomfortable frames of the sonnet" (Billip 73).Commentingon the limitations of the sonnet has, since Dmochowski,developed into a tradition that has united the Sonnets' critics and theiradmirers.Writingabout "The CrimeanSonnets"at the beginningof thetwentieth century, Julian Klaczko lamented the poet's choice of "thatfourteen-lineframe, where everythingseems to be calculatedto limit thefree strivingsof the heart, to reducepoetry to the level of an intellectualgame" (Zgorzelski117). CzeslawZgorzelski,the authorof one of the mostsensibleanalysesof TheSonnets,quotesKlaczkoand reaffirmshis view ofthe limitingcharacterof the sonnet's narrowframe.Zgorzelskiconcludeshis analysisby statingthatMickiewiczwas able to bring ife to the "stone-like, mathematicallydeterminedcontoursof the sonnet"(118). In a recentanalysisof the Crimeancycle, Roman Koropeckyjhas taken the anti-sonnet stance to another level. Koropeckyjtalks about the "unyieldingconfines of the sonnet" which in Mickiewicz'scycle tightly contain theMuslim inhabitants of the Crimea (Koropeckyj, below p. 670).3 Whatcould have motivated Mickiewiczto choose the sonnet sequence? Andwhat were his decisions' broaderculturalimplications?The sonnet ap-pealedto romantic ensibilityas a literary ormwhich,inspiteof itsappear-ance of rigidity,opened up its space to encompasseither parallelor op-posed vantagepoints. Because of its binarystructure, t was well suitedforthe purpose of narratinga nineteenth-century ravelogue. Finally, as a


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The Sonnet, the Sequence,the Qasidah 645literary ormwhose originswere presumedto be oriental,it was a perfectmediumfornarratingan Oriental ourney.

Traditionally,n the sonnet'stwo quatrains he authorstates and devel-ops a theme. This means that the sonnet's octave is often descriptive ncharacter.The tercetscontaineither a meditationon the maintheme, oranantitheticalstatement. Thus the sestet may be reflexive in character, ncontrast o the octave. Fora poet of Mickiewicz's eneration,the choice ofthe sonnet was certainlynot surprising.WactawKubacki,who looks at"The CrimeanSonnets" in the context of the ideology of romanticism,explainssome of the reasons for a literary synthesis.The sonnet invitessuch a synthesis by standingat the crossroadsof epic, lyric poetry, anddrama,as it traditionally ncompassesdescriptiveandlyricalelements,andcouldalso includedialogue.Moreimportant till is the sonnet's dual struc-ture, its division into octaves and sestets, which represents formallythesonnet'sthematicdynamic Kubacki156).The sonnet quite naturallyoffers the poet the possibilityof thematizingthe dualityof its structureand of exploringall sorts of parallelsand antithe-ses. Thebeliefin a multifarious haracterof being, symbolicallymanifestedin reflections, shadows, echoes--was at the core of the romantic worldview. Mickiewicz'sSonnets offer a richgroundfor the analysisof parallelmotifs and structures.His sestets enter into an arrayof relationshipswiththe octavesthroughoutTheSonnets. In SonnetVI, "MorningandDusk,"for example,the contrastbetween the surroundingworld at different imesof the day,morning n the octave andeveningin the sestet, emphasizes helover'sprevailing adness;his mood does not changewith the comingof theevening. In "Calmat Sea," the contrastbetween the apparentcalm of thesea's surfacein the octave and the activityof sea life hiddenbeneaththesurface n the sestet givesriseto a metaphorof the traveler'smind.Memo-ries of times past are less likely to disturbhim at times of emotionalup-heaval than at moments of peace. In "View of the Mountainsfrom theKozlov Steppes," the octave and the sestet belong to differentspeakerswho assess reality from diverse perspectives.Similarrelationshipsexistbetween consecutivesonnets, such as the humorouspairof SonnetsXVIIIandXIX of the Odessasequence. In XVIII ("The Visit"),an impassionedsubjectbecomesquite upset with a streamof visitorswho engagein smalltalk at a pointwhen he would ratherenjoy a momentof intimacywiththehostess. In XIX an omniscientvoice offers some practicaladvice to thevisitor:when you come upon two people who maybe seated precariouslyclose to each other, or whose clothingappearssomewhatdisheveled, it isadvisableto simplysay goodbye and to depart.The two sonnetsdeal withthesamesituation,but eachrenders t fromadistinctivelydifferentperspec-tive. Mickiewicz ndicates similarrelationshipsbetween adjacentsonnetsof both sequencesby the sonnets'titles, suggestiveof reflectedor inverted


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646 Slavicand EastEuropeanJournalimages.Some of the titles of the "CrimeanSonnets" llustrate he tendencyto includeanother,or at timesclearlythe other,perspective n the picture.For example, "Bakczysaraj" recedes "Bakczysarajby Night," "Alushtaby Day" precedes "Alushtaby Night." Other, "thematic"pairs are alsoformed by Sonnets VIII and IX ("Potocka'sGrave" and "Tombsof theHarem"),as well as Sonnets XIII andXIV ("Czatyrdagh"nd"Pilgrim").In additionto the dialogical interplaywithin individualsonnets and con-secutive sonnets in the sequence, there is also the dualityof the collectionitself, itsdivision nto the Odessasonnets and "TheCrimeanSonnets."Theinner-cyclicrelationshipsencouragethe reader to look for largerunits ofmeaningthatemergewithinboth sequences.

Even thoughMickiewiczsignalsa sequence by groupingsonnetsof thesecond cycle under a unifyingtitle, manyof The Sonnets'originalreadersfailedto recognizethat the innerdynamicof "TheCrimeanSonnets"corre-sponds to the organizationof a travelogue. Since the form's inception,sonnet writers have often grouped their poems in sequences. MichaelSpillerhas analyzeddifferenttypes of "connectedness"within sonnet se-quences.He pointsout that the sonnetsmaybe "arrangedo unfolda storyto the extent that the people and objectsin it arepresentedas they wouldbe in a novel, with descriptionsof place and time and character."At thesame time, he pointsout that "Narrative s an uncommonkind of linkage,since its demandstend to obliterate the internal wholenessof single son-nets"(TheSonnetSequence140). "TheCrimeanSonnets"display he char-acteristicsof all the different"waysof aggregating"discussedby Spiller:they are lyric, philosophical,and topographical.Moreover, Mickiewicznarratesthe experienceof a journey in this cycle, with a clearlymarkeddeparture,passage, and a point of arrival. The individualsonnets of thesequencedo preservetheirwholeness. In factit is each sonnet'sdual struc-ture that allows the poet to capturethe essence of a typicalnineteenth-centurytravelogue.In the eighteenthcentury, he voguefor foreigntravelandthe writingoftravelogues n WesternEuropeassumedproportionsmuchgreaterthan inany prior period. The perceived educationalvalue of the Grand Tourplayed a role in these developments. Consequently, hose travelerswhoresponded to the public's growinginterest in travel literature strove toleave factual, "objective"descriptionsof their travels. Driven by a thirstfor knowledge, the travelerviewed himself as a researcherdedicated toverifyingexistinginformationand to acquiringnew knowledge.These ac-countsthusovertlysubordinatedautobiographyo observationandinstruc-tion (Batten 1-46).In LaurenceSterne'sSentimentalourney,published n 1768,travelfunc-tioned as a mere pretext for an introspectiveexaminationof the self inrelationto others. Sterne'scriticismof the establishednormsof the Grand


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The Sonnet,the Sequence,the Qasidah 647Tour marked a turning point in the history of travel writing as a genre.With Chateaubriand's Travels, the writer's attention shifted even moredecisively from descriptions of the environment to intimations of the trav-eler's inner states. Most nineteenth-century travels combined elements ofan "enlightened" and a romantic journey. Their authors often supple-mented descriptions of the places they visited with intimations of "internallandscapes," providing records of the traveler's psychological experienceagainst the background of the lands they crossed. They were thus able tosatisfy those readers who were interested in the tour-guide componentof travel descriptions; at the same time, they kept up with the spirit of thetimes by providing insights into their own biographies and by intimating tothe readers the feelings which accompanied them during the journey. AsSeweryna Wysiouch argues, the object of perception per se does not comeinto focus in "The Crimean Sonnets." The sequence can hardly serve as aguide to the Crimea (50, 51). Yet, in Mickiewicz's travelogue, the jour-ney's physical motions and the subject's immediate impressions of the sitesengage his thought process in a way which results in a binary composition.The structure of the sonnet corresponds perfectly to the two-facetedcharacter of a romantic travel description. In the first four sonnets ofMickiewicz's Crimean sequence, one can see the division between therecording of sensory impressions of the journey in the octave, and thereflections of the lyrical persona awakened by these impressions in thesestet. In this way, the descriptive octaves find their mirror reflections inthe sestets which reveal the traveler's state of mind. His feelings eithercontrast or are in harmony with the world around him. The pattern whichemerges in the first four of the "Crimean Sonnets" breaks down after thefifth, and the dynamic of the octave-sestet relationship becomes more com-plex in the following sonnets. In the fifth sonnet, for example, this divisionis complicated by the introduction of the voice of the Tatar Mirza in thesestet. However, in the last sonnet, "Ayudah," Mickiewicz returns to theclear division established at the outset of the sequence. The lyrical voiceagain records visual impressions in the octave and reflects upon them in thesestet. This restoration of the octave-sestet pattern emphasizes the char-acter of the "Sonnets" as a romantic travelogue in which the traveler'simpressions of the foreign land are followed by intimations of the land-scapes of his soul.Ostensibly, travel in "The Crimean Sonnets" denotes movement inspace. In "Baydary" (Sonnet X), for example, the traveler records:

Lasy,doliny, glazy,w kolei, w natlokuU n6g mychptyna,ginajak fale potoku.(Woods, valley,cliffs, in a swarming hain,Beneathme flow,vanish ikeripples n a stream.)


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648 Slavic and East European JournalBut any journey becomes inevitably associated with a movement in time.Both in the sonnets of the Odessa cycle and in "The Crimean Sonnets"Mickiewicz takes advantage of the sonnet's dual structure to represent atension that exists in the subject's consciousness between the present mo-ment and the past. The present usually lures the subject/traveler and en-tices him to enjoy life by submitting to the flow of events. On the otherhand, the traveler's past experiences, his memories of the people andplaces he has left behind, are just as compelling. In the Odessa sonnets, forexample, in Sonnet XII "To .. ." the subject's flirtation with the currentobject of his attention who, in the octave, lights an "unholy fire" of carnaldesire in his heart ["niegodny ogien zapalasz w mym tonie"] is contrasted inthe sestet with the assertion that the subject's place is "among the cemeter-ies and coffins of the past." The promise of instant gratification does not, inthis sonnet, overpower a longing for the past that goes beyond pleasure.In "The Crimean Sonnets," already the first sonnet is marked by thetension between the experience of the present moment and memories ofthe past. This sonnet constitutes an initiation into the journey conceptual-ized as movement in space. The very first word of the sonnet--"I havesailed onto .. ." ["Wplynqlem"]-means that the traveler is already on hisway. The present tense of all the verbs that follow gives the octave thecharacter of a reportage-like narration. In the first part of the sonnetMickiewicz foregrounds the immediate and engulfing immensity of the"dry ocean" of the steppe. The perfect horizontality of the perspectivefurther emphasizes the illusion of vast space that the sonnet creates. Thisview of the landscape is only violated when the persona looks upwards.Failing to discern a road ahead of him, the traveler looks at the stars insearch of guidance.The traveler's movement in space becomes arrested at the beginning ofthe sestet with his cry: "Stojmy!"("Let's stop!"). At the same time, there isa progression from the visual immensity in the octave to the audible detailin the sestet:

..-slyszq ciagnacezurawie,Slysze,kedysiqmotyl kolysana trawie.Kedywaz sliskapiersiadotykasiqziola.(I canhearthe cranes lying,I canhearwhere the butterfulyhoverson a blade of grass,Wherethe snake'sslickbreasttouchesthe grass.)

While the poem's last two lines add to the impression of the silent vast-ness of the steppe, the subject's thoughts move far beyond his immediatesurroundings:


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The Sonnet, the Sequence, the Qasidah 649W takiej ciszy! takuchonatqiamciekawie,Ze slyszalbym losz Litwy. Jedimy, nikt nie wola.(Insuch silence! I strainmyearwithcuriosity,I couldalmosthear a voice fromLithuanialet's go, no one is calling.)

As in the case of other sonnets in the two sequences, Mickiewicz builds"The Akerman Steppes" on a series of oppositions between the octave andthe sestet. Movement in space and the recording of visual impressionsdominate the octave. In the sestet, movement is transposed into stillnessand aural effects become predominant. The audible details emphasize thegreat silence of the steppe and create an atmosphere that stimulates reflec-tion. The temporal dimension of travel is emphasized. The anticipated"voice from Lithuania" is a certain sign of homesickness gripping the trav-eler's heart. An obvious reason why the voice cannot be heard is the actualphysical distance which separates the persona from Lithuania, although theconditional form of the verb "slyszalbym" ["I would hear," "I would like tohear"] may also express doubt as to whether anybody is actually calling himfrom the remote homeland. It is the plot of memory that concerns thesubject: he remembers, but he is also aware of being absent and thereforeforgotten. In one of the most often cited passages of Chateaubriand's Trav-els the author calls the name of Leonidas at the site where Sparta oncestood:A mixtureof admiration ndgriefchecked the currentof my thoughts,andfixedme to thespot: profound ilencereignedaroundme. Determined,at least, to make echospeak n a spotwhere the human voice is no longer heard, I shouted with all my might--"Leonidas!Leonidas!"No ruinrepeated hisgreatname,andSpartaherselfseemed to haveforgottenherhero. (Chateaubriand38)Leonidas is dead, and modern Greece may have forgotten him. Chateaubri-and, of course, usurps for himself the right to remember by calling theancient hero's name. In "The Akerman Steppes" the situation is reversed -unlike Leonidas, Mickiewicz's subject is there, very much alive and ready tohear the call, but nobody summons him. Has Lithuania forgotten her"hero"? Departure, like thoughts of death, often provokes the one who isdeparting not only to brood about the past, but also to ponder what willremain of him in the memory of others.Mickiewicz's persona quickly overcomes the feeling of grief. The lastwords of the sonnet: -"Let's go, no one is calling" ["jedzmy, nikt niewola"] -suggest that the traveler successfully resists the temptation todwell on memories of the past. However, as further developments in thesequence demonstrate, his reconciliation with the loss of everything that heassociates with his homeland is not complete; grief will resurface in othersonnets.


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650 Slavicand EastEuropeanJournalThe sonnets of recollection and mourning appear at fairly regular inter-vals. Sonnets I, II, VIII, XIV belong to this group. Both the traveler's

progress, and the cycle's inner dynamic provide the motivation for theirpositioning. In the first and second sonnet, we are dealing with an earlystage of the journey, when memories of departure are still fresh. In thefollowing sonnets, thoughts of home overcome the traveler at times whenthe pace of his journey slows down, and the world around him becomessilent.4 Thus, the tension between the past and the present moment under-lies not only individual sonnets; it runs through the entire cycle of "TheCrimean Sonnets," and it is just as much perceptible in the Odessa sonnets.It is as if two voices, one demanding the traveler's loyalty to the past, theother telling him to enjoy the moment, competed for his attention. Theform of the sonnet and the sonnet sequence invites such dialogue.The relationship between the sonnet's octave and the sestet is inherentlydialogical. The sestet mirrors the octave in that it is also divided in twoparts, but the three lines of each of its parts contrast with the four lines ofthe quatrains. There is room for a difference of opinion within the space ofthe sonnet; its very form questions the possibility of a single and finalmeaning. Paul Oppenheimer, who associates the birth of the sonnet withthe development of the modern mind, contends that "the idea of turninginward, implicit in the form of the sonnet, contained a dangerous question"that would lead to the undermining of the medieval system of beliefs (TheBirth 4). In Mickiewicz's poetic travelogue the formal mark of a differencepresent in the octave-sestet relationship also becomes an emblem of adialogue that takes place when the traveler experiences a new, culturallydifferent environment. The fifth sonnet of the cycle, "View of the Moun-tains from the Kozlov Steppes," where the traveler asks questions aboutthe awesome spectacle of Crimean nature, and his Tartar guide Mirzaprovides the answers, puts this relationship in focus. Thus, rather thanconfining the Muslim inhabitants of the Crimea, the sonnet provides astructure for introducing into the cycle a voice that represents them. More-over, the Tartar's voice assumes great prominence: he is an authoritativeinterlocutor who offers answers to the traveler's questions. The location ofhis voice in the sestet provides yet another example of a perfectly harmo-nious interplay of form and meaning in Mickiewicz's Sonnets.5When considering the cultural ramifications and consequences of Mickie-wicz's choice of the sonnet, the genealogy of this literary form must not beignored. In his analysis of "The Crimean Sonnets" Wactcaw Kubacki pointsout that the romantics were aware of the sonnet's Oriental origin (157). Herefers to several nineteenth-century sources which considered the affinitiesbetween the ghazal and the sonnet (95-97). Like the sonnet, the ghazal hasa regular metric and rhyming pattern. It is at the same time descriptive andreflexive. Kubacki also mentions a lecture given at the university in Vilnius


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The Sonnet, the Sequence,the Qasidah 651in 1817 in which an Italian scholar, A. Capelli, discussed Eastern influenceson Petrarch (97). Josef von Hammer, whose Geschichte der schoenenRedekuenste Persiens Mickiewicz cited in his notes to "The Crimean Son-nets," asserted elsewhere that the form of the ottava rima and partly alsothat of the sonnet, as well as the latter's name, had been borrowed by theItalians from the Arabs (Hammer-Purgstall 21). Given the preoccupationwith Orientalism in nineteenth-century scholarship and literature, the son-net's genealogy could only increase the poet's curiosity about this literaryform. The prevalence of Orientalist interests among the faculty and manyof the alumni of Mickiewicz's alma mater, the Vilnius University, has beenwell documented (Zajaczkowski). In this context, Mickiewicz doubtlesslyassociated the sonnet with its supposed Oriental origin.In light of this scenario, the dialogue between Mickiewicz's Pilgrim andthe Muslim Mirza in "The Crimean Sonnets" forms a reenactment of acultural exchange that had already taken place before this literary encoun-ter. The sonnet sequence presents a perfect medium for the writing of anoriental travelogue; at the same time, Mickiewicz's choice of the sonnet forthe cycle takes us back to the moment of this literary form's inception.Unlike nineteenth-century sources, recent studies of the development ofthe sonnet often ignore the possibility of an Arab influence. Paul Oppen-heimer focuses on the influence of classical Greek and Roman literatures,while Michael Spiller emphasizes the influence of Provengal poetry in thedevelopment of the sonnet (Oppenheimer, The Birth 22-25, Spiller, TheDevelopment 15-27). For the purpose of The Sonnets' analysis, it is Mickie-wicz's own belief in the sonnet's oriental origin that really matters. Yet,given the cultural milieu which surrounded the sonnet's first appearance,the hypotheses of two centuries ago may indeed deserve some credit.The first European sonnets were written at the court of Emperor Fred-eric II of Sicily, in the first part of the thirteenth century. Twenty-five of thethirty-five original sonnets that are known from that milieu are attributedto the Emperor's notary, Giacomo da Lentino, who is usually credited withthe invention of this poetic form (Wilkins). Should the sonnet's structureindeed be Giacomo's ingenious literary invention, the cultural context inwhich this discovery appeared is certainly a factor to consider. Frederic IIwas Sicily's third Christian ruler after its recapture from the Arabs, whohad ruled the island from around 902. According to W. M. Watt, Sicilyprospered under Arab rule, and Islamic culture took firm root there (5).Sicily was recaptured by a Norman knight, Roger. As Watt explains:In the reconquest of Sicily material motives seem to have been stronger than religious ones,and in many respects it remained part of the Islamic world. The externals of the life of some ofthe later rulers seemed to contemporaries more Muslim than Christian. In particular Roger'sson Roger II (1130-54) and the latter's grandson Frederick II of Hohenstaufen (1215-50)have been called "the two baptized sultans of Sicily." (5)


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652 Slavicand EastEuropeanJournalOppenheimer points out that Wilkins, in "The Invention of the Sonnet,"at first speculated that the sonnet's sestet may have derived from the Arab

zajal, but he later abandoned this idea. In "The Origin of the Sonnet"Oppenheimer himself recognizes that the atmosphere of the court of Fred-eric II, "the most brilliant, intellectual, and literary emperor of the age,"provided the necessary context for the development of the sonnet but, likeothers, he stops short of considering a direct Arab influence (300). Asystematic investigation of the history of the genre, and even more so of themerits of the different hypotheses which explain the sonnet's origin, isoutside the scope of this essay. In a bibliographical essay Michael Spillerobserves that towards the end of the nineteenth centurynationalism had bedeviled discussions of the sonnet with two controversies: was the sonnet inits origins French/Provencal or was it a native Italian creation? -an issue of more thanacademic interest during the Italian struggle for independence in the nineteenth century. (TheSonnet Sequence 161).One can only hope that it is not a similar sort of Eurocentric particularismthat has prevented Western scholars from recognizing that what Oppen-heimer identifies as the inception of modern poetry in the West may havebegun as a dialogue with the East.

There was nothing original in transforming a journey to the East into amodern pilgrimage by the time Mickiewicz wrote about the Crimea.Mickiewicz followed in the footsteps of some formidable predecessors. Butpilgrimages have always been conceived as journeys towards a source of anessential truth, and, as such, they have tended to reaffirm that single truth.By contrast, Mickiewicz in his journey towards the wellspring of humancreativity emphasizes the continued importance of dialogue. If Mickiewiczindeed decided to adapt the form of the sonnet sequence for his Orientaltravelogue because of the sonnet's Oriental origin, thereby reenacting theoriginal, seminal exchange, then it may very well be that the analogy be-tween the two sonnet sequences and the genres of Arabic literature doesnot stop there. Indeed, if considered in their entirety the Odessa sonnetsand "The Crimean Sonnets" form the type of narrative that resembles anolder genre of Arabic poetry from which the ghazal is said to have evolved,the qasidah.

The Qasidah ConnectionIn his lengthy analysis of "The Crimean Sonnets" Waclaw Kubackistresses the idea that parallel structures form the sonnets' backbone. How-ever, he overlooks the fact that an investigation of any such structuresshould also account for the fact that The Sonnets contained not one, buttwo sonnet sequences. The sequence which precedes the Crimean travel-


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The Sonnet,the Sequence,the Qasidah 653ogue, the so-called Odessa sonnets, has received far less attention than hasthe former one, not only in Kubacki's monograph, but in the work of otherscholars as well. Even fewer have looked at the volume in its entirety. Oneof the few who have considered the possibility of viewing The Sonnets as aunit is Czestaw Zgorzelski.Zgorzelski presents an interesting investigation of the inner dynamic ofthe two cycles. He points out stylistic and thematic continuities: withincertain groups of sonnets, certain motifs arise, then continue and subside.He also points to the sonnets which both sum up the developments of a partof the cycle and foreshadow its further course. He talks about the cycles'progression. A certain dialectic seems to operate on at least two levels. Ona metaliterary level, in the first cycle there is a clear progression of literaryconventions. From sonnets which borrow from Petrarch, through sentimen-tal poetry, and the poetry of romantic disenchantment, to irony that bringsall social forms and literary conventions into question, to the sober realismin the sonnets that come near the cycle's end. Mickiewicz clearly empha-sizes the literariness of his own utterance. As Zgorzelski puts it:One can tracethe hand of the master,who does not intend to conceal his activity.Quitethecontrary:he is interested n providinga crafted, iterary orm forhisutterance.In thisgroupof sonnets one can hear a rich traditionof severalcenturies,they resoundwith echoes ofPetrarchn thewayof presentinghe sorrowsandjoysof an ideal love. Justasin thefollowinggroup,one will hear the echoes of Byron.(105)

On another level, underneath the literary conventions there is whatMickiewicz's friend Tomasz Zan referred to as the "journey of the heart"(Billip 337). The Odessa sonnets present subsequent phases of a relation-ship: from a pure fascination with the beloved through the relationship'sripening to disenchantment. The last three sonnets of the first cycle providea synthesis of the different stages of an emotional journey that continuedthroughout The Sonnets' first part. Sonnet XXI entitled "Danaids" endswith this summa summarum:Danaidy!rzucatemw bezdeiiwaszejcheciDary,piesnii we izachroztopionaduszqDzis z hojnego am skapy,z czutegoszyderca.(Danaids! havethrown nto the abyssof yourdesireGifts,songsand a soul thatin tears hadmelted;Todayno longergenerous,I havebecome a miser,no longertender,I'm nowa jester . ..)

Zgorzelski rightly points out that this sonnet does not mark the end of theroad for the Sonnets' persona. This journey breaks out of the boundariesof the first cycle, and continues into the second, Crimean, cycle. Thesuccessive stages of the journey through the steppe, by sea, and through


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654 SlavicandEastEuropeanJournalthe mountains will mark--just as did the successive love episodes in theprevious cycle -the traveler's subsequent transformations. In Zgorzelski'swords: "We first see him with a grimace of Byronic disbelief on his face,but later, in front of the majestic beauty of nature he changes into apilgrim who stares at the skyrocketing greatness of Chatyrdagh" (117).The thematic and structural continuities that unite the two sonnet cyclesjustify viewing the entire collection as a single sequence. The Odessa son-nets and "The Crimean Sonnets" complement each other just as the sestetcomplements the octave. But a much sharper correspondence exists be-tween the narrative structure of Mickiewicz's Sonnets and the primary formof classical Arabic literature: the qasidah. Mickiewicz was certainly familiarwith this literary form. During the time of his Russian exile, the poetauthored two translations from the French of Arab qasidahs, "Szanfary. AQasidah from the Arabic," and "Almotenabby," and one original poem,"Farys. A Qasidah Composed in Honor of Emir Tadj-Ul-Fekhr." All threepoems have been analyzed by scholars interested in Arab influences inMickiewicz's poetry (UziQbto, Benda, Segel). Even though the same au-thors refer to "The Crimean Sonnets" as Mickiewicz's best "Oriental"work, they do not consider the possibility of any influences of Arabicliterary forms on the sonnet sequence.

According to J6zef Bielawski: the qasidah - "narrative poem with agoal" is the most refined form of Old Arabic literature. There are two mainparts to a qasidah: "one is more conventional, less diversified, the otherone, where the poet addresses the main subject and reaches his end, ismore diversified" (27). Other authors explain that traditionally the qasidahdeveloped a tripartite structure, and consisted of an amatory prologue, adisengagement, and the main theme. The poet was free to allow himselfcertain latitude within this structure.In the nasib, the qasidah's first and most conventional part, the poetoften travels with some companions, and he comes across the site of aformer encampment. He halts his journey, and in his memory he goes backto the happy times he spent there with his beloved. In his analysis of theqasidah Abdulla El Tayib writes about the nasib:The mention of the abode, or indeed anythingassociatedwith it, evokes memoriesof thebeloved and of pasthoursof happiness.Thepoet'sheart s movedbyanything eminiscent fit- the name of a land, its sand dunes, its hills, the stars that indicate the way to it to thetraveler... (46)

Mickiewicz's Sonnet VIII from the Odessa cycle, entitled "To theNiemen River," sums up the developments of the preceding sonnets. Eventhough Mickiewicz published an earlier version of this sonnet already in1822, here, in the context of the sequence it possess all of the characteris-tics of the nasib.


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The Sonnet, the Sequence, the Qasidah 655Niemnie,domowarzekomoja!Gdziesa wody,Kt6reniegdyS zerpaiemw niemowlqcedionie,Na kt6rychpotemw dzikieplywatemustronie,Sercuniespokojnemu zukajacochiody?Tu Laura,patrzac chlub4naciei swejurody,Lubitawioszaplatac zakwiecadkronie,Tu obraz ej malownyw srebrnej ali tonieLzaminierazmacilemzapaleniecmiody.Niemnie,domowarzeko,gdziezsa tamtezdroje,A z nimityleszczqecia,nadziei akwiele?Kedy est mitelatekdziecinnychwesele?Gdziemilszeburzliwegowiekuniepokoje?Kedyjest Lauramoja, gdziesa przyjaciele?Wszystkoprzeszlo,a czemuznie przejda zymoje!(Niemen,the riverof myhome!wherethe waters lowThat I once drewwithmyyouthfulhands,WhereI later swamto the wildnotchSearchingor a cool respite ormy unrulyheartHereLaura ookingproudlyat the reflectionof herbeautyLikedto braidherhair andherforeheadwith flowers o adornHere, more than herpicturepaintedon the bosomof a silverwaveI spoiledmorethan oncewithmytears,a hot-headedyouth.Niemen,the riverof myhome,where are thosewaters,Andwith them all the happiness, o manyhopes?Wherehas the merriment f mychildhoodgone?Wherewouldthe stormsof myrebelliousage be nicer?WherehasmyLauragone, where aremyfriends?Everythinghaspassed,everything,butwhynotmytears?)

Another feature of the nasib is worth mentioning in the context of thisanalysis: the portrait of the beloved that emerges from the nasib is oftenequivocal: "The inamorata is often said to belong to an enemy tribe, andthus she serves the double role of a person sought after, but also proudlyrejected when her demands grow excessive" (Tayib 44).The tension that mounts in Sonnets XII through XX of Mickiewicz'sOdessa cycle clearly leads to the realization that the demands of the be-loved have grown excessive, and the subject's rejection of her follows.Independently of whether or not Karolina Sobaniskaprovided the inspira-tion, the beloved of the Odessa sonnets appears to be a great deal closer tothe "inamorata" of a qasidah than she is to Petrarch's Laura.How do "The Crimean Sonnets" compare to the following parts of theqasidah? Abdulla El Tayib writes: "The disengagement (takhallus) formsthe second section of the qasidah, in which the poet makes his way out ofthe nasib towards the main motive of his qasidah." This is accomplished by


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656 Slavicand EastEuropeanJournaldescribing a journey which the poet may have undertaken "to consolehimself and forget her (his) beloved in pursuing some other serious pur-pose, or to desert her just as she has done to him" (52). The same authorprovides several examples of "the disengagement." For example, Labid inhis Mu'allaqah "severs the rope of amity with his inamorata of the nasib inretaliation for her turning away from him, and consoles himself by travel-ing on a swift riding-camel in pursuit of a more serious purpose" (54).Passing from a description of the second to the third part, El Tayib notes:The takhallusourneyexpresses he attemptat seekingrelieffromthe intenseemotion of thenasib. The"journey," icturedn termsof camel,desertandsympatheticommunication ithaspectsandphenomenaof nature,symbolizes hepoet'sendeavor o change roman introvertto an extrovertmood. The pathof thejourney eads into the maintheme,with whichcomesthe ultimate ense of relief. (56)"The Crimean Sonnets" approximate both the "disengagement" and the"main theme" of the qasidah. Interpreted as a description of a journey - ina large part on horseback--the sonnets correspond to the takhallus ofclassical Arab poetry. Throughout the journey the poet gives his readershints as to his ultimate destination. Sonnets V and XV are especially sugges-tive: both of them record the experience of sublimity. Approaching thesublime in nature constitutes a pilgrimage to the source of creation. Thelast of "The Crimean Sonnets," "Ajudah," is nothing less than Mickie-wicz's "Exegi monumentum." Here the poet arrives at a reaffirmation ofhis identity and creative energy. The journey to the realm of the absoluteresults in songs that will not perish ["niesmiertelne piesni"].The similarities between the structuring of the qasidah and the narrativedynamic of The Sonnets as a unit explain Mickiewicz's decision to publishboth cycles, the Odessa sonnets and "The Crimean Sonnets," in one volume.A sustained heterogeneous view of culture emerges as the most significantideological consequence of the subtextual relationship of Mickiewicz's son-net sequence to the qasidah. The undercurrent of oriental influences in TheSonnets represents a nourishing, identity-forming relationship between whatMickiewicz and people around him would have referred to as the West andthe East, without necessarily recognizing that the realm they themselvesinhabited bore the quality of an in-between.Poland remained throughout its history geographically and culturallyclose to the Orient. It was therefore a fertile ground for the renewedcultural and scholarly interest in "things oriental" which was so characteris-tic of the intellectual atmosphere in Europe in the late 1700s and 1800s.The great ethnic diversity of the eastern outskirts of Poland must havefacilitated such interests. But Poland's proximity to the Orient, and a longhistory of political and military conflicts with its Tatar and Ottoman neigh-bors which intensified especially in the course of the seventeenth century


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The Sonnet,the Sequence,the Qasidah 657resulted also in a tradition of anti-Muslim prejudice. In his notes to theCollectanea, an anthology of Turkish sources to the study of Polish history,one of the most eminent Orientalists of Mickiewicz's times, J6zefSekowski, spoke against such prejudice. Sqkowski argued against historio-graphic mythmaking and in favor of using Ottoman sources in order toarrive at a more balanced view of Poland's history. "Our century is tooenlightened to take offense at what people of a different faith say. Prudenttolerance is required of both sides. For the sake of truth and knowledge, letus make a noble sacrifice of our self-adulation," argued the author (1: IX).In the introduction to his work's second volume, Sqkowski continued:Imbuedwith theprejudicesof ourcivilization,whichwe consider o be the onlyone, we havecome to view the Turksas a nationbereftof educationwhile, afterall, there can exist twocompletely different, dissimilar, but equally good civilizations. [. . .] On what grounds couldwerequire hat allpeopleacceptoursystemof beliefs,thattheyacceptasbeautiful hatwhichwe find beautiful . . that they look at the world from the same perspectiveas we do, aperspectiveadditionally oloredby a charming rismof ourself-delusionswhichwe asa habittaketo standforreality. 2: VIII-XII)

Mickiewicz's oriental interests may have been kindled by both Sekow-ski's work and his personal contacts with the scholar (Segel 280). At thetime of the Sonnets' writing Mickiewicz clearly shared Sqkowski's attitudetowards cultures of the East, even though the ideological trajectories thatthe two men of letters would later follow were not always consistent withtheir earlier beliefs. In the Sonnets, the realization that a relation of mutualopenness and dialogue between the cultures of the West and the East, maybe beneficial to both sides follows from the belief that there may be twodifferent but equally good civilizations. Frustrated with the critics' re-sponse to the Sonnets, Mickiewicz further articulated his views concerningthe relationships of different cultures in his polemics "On Warsaw Criticsand Reviewers." Countering the opinions of those who criticized his open-ness towards foreign influences and who feared that this attitude wouldbring the downfall of national culture Mickiewicz maintained that. . predictions oncerning he imminentcollapseof literatureandtastein Polandappear obe baseless at leastno such threatemanates romromanticism.The historyof world itera-turedemonstrateshat the collapseof tasteand a dearthof talenthaveeverywhere esultedfrom one cause: from limiting [the culture]to a certainnumberof truths, thoughts,andopinionswhoseexhaustion eadsto [theculture's] tarvationand death becauseof a lackofnourishment.5: 316)

A narrow interpretation of all Orientalist discourse as imperialist masterdiscourse obliterates the possibility of a non-violent discursive relationshipof which both Sekowski and Mickiewicz appear to have been advocates.Yet, clearly it is not aggression projected onto the other, but an identity-forming cultural exchange that lies at the origin of the sonnet and that isreaffirmed by Mickiewicz in his sonnet sequence. The journey into the land


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658 Slavic and East European Journalof the (other) poet is a necessary element towards the discovery of one'sown creative energy. The displacement that came with exile allowed Mickie-wicz to recognize and respect the difference of the other, and to embracethe otherness within himself. Within a postcolonial theoretical perspectiveThe Sonnets may be interpreted as occupying a space that "opens up thepossibility of a cultural hybridity that entertains difference without an as-sumed or imposed hierarchy" (Bhabha 4).

NOTESMy work on Polish nineteenth-century Orientalism was aided by grants from the AmericanCouncil of Learned Societies and the Social Science Research Council. I am grateful toMonika Greenleaf for inspiring me to reread The Sonnets, and to Halina Filipowicz for hergreat dedication in bringing the Mickiewicz forum to fruition.1 Karolina Sobafiska's miscellany is part of the collection of the Pushkin House in St.

Petersburg. Item number 244, page 60.2 Topcy-Basa, a Persian who grew up in Tiflis, taught Oriental languages at the universityin Petersburg along with Osip Senkovsky (Sqkowski).3 I wish to thank Roman Koropeckyj for kindly inviting me to read his article before itappeared in print and thus prolonging our dialogue concerning Mickiewicz's work.4 Edward Stankiewicz analyzes the tension between visual and auditory impressions in thesonnets. He asserts that "the progressive journey in space is thus at each point stalled by aretrospective journey in time, and under the surface of the outer, exotic world flows anundercurrent of the poet's innermost longings and aspirations." He then notes that "whilethe eye looks ahead into the darkness, seeking the guiding stars, the ear listens to voicesof the past, to that which is intimate and dear, but remains silent, because it is promptedonly by memory, by an act of the mind" (496-98).5 I have analyzed the relationship between the traveler/pilgrim and the Mirza of "TheCrimean Sonnets" in 1998.

WORKS CITEDBatten, Charles L. Pleasurable Instruction: Form and Convention in Eighteenth-CenturyTravelLiterature. Berkeley: U of California P, 1978.Bhabha, Homi K. The Location of Culture. London: Routledge, 1994.Benda, Lucjan. "Pierwiastki arabskie w tw6rczosci Adama Mickiewicza." Adam Mickiewicz.

Londyn: Polskie Towarzystwo Naukowe, 1955. 269-280.Bielawski, J6zef. Klasyczna literaturaarabska. Warszawa: Dialog, 1995.Billip, Witold. Mickiewicz w oczach wsp6lczesnych: Dzieje recepcji na ziemiach polskich wlatach 1818-1830. Antologia. Wroclaw: Ossolineum, 1962.Chateaubriand, Francois Rene. Travels in Greece, Palestine, Egypt and Barbary During theYears1806 and 1807. Vol. 1. Trans. Frederic Shoberl. London: H. Colburn, 1812.Gibb, H. A. R. Arabic Literature. An Introduction. London: Oxford UP, 1926.

Hammer-Purgstall, Josef von. Literaturgeschichte der Araber. Erster Band. Wien: Kaiserl.,Hof-und-Staatsdrukerei, 1850.Kalinowska, Izabela. "The Dialogue Between East and West in the Crimean Sonnets." ThePolish Review 4 (1998): 429-439.


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The Sonnet, the Sequence, the Qasidah 659Kubacki,Waciaw.Z Mickiewiczem a Krymie.Warszawa: aistwowy InstytutWydawniczy,1977.Mickiewicz,Adam. Dziela wszystkie.Warszawa:NakiademSkarbuRzeczpospolitejPolski,1936.Mickiewicz,Wiadystaw.ZywotAdamaMickiewicza.Poznaii:PolskieTowarzystwo rzyjaci6oNauk,1929.Oppenheimer,Paul. "TheOriginof the Sonnet."Comparative iterature 4. 4 (1982):289-304.

.The Birth of the Modern Mind: Self Consciousness, and the Invention of the Sonnet.Oxford:OxfordUP, 1989.Segel, H. B. "Mickiewicz and the Arabic Qasidah in Poland." American Contributions to the

Fifth International Congress of Slavists. The Hague: Mouton, 1963. 279-300.Sekowski. J6sef. Collectanea z dziejopis6w tureckich rzeczy do historyi polskiej stuzacych. 2vols. Warsaw:Zawadzki Wqcki,1824-25.Spiller, Michael. The Development of the Sonnet: An Introduction. London: Routledge, 1992.The Sonnet Sequence: A Study of Its Strategies. London: Twayne Publishers, 1997.Stankiewicz,Edward."SoundandSightin the SonetyKrymskie f AdamMickiewicz."ForWiktor Weintraub:Essays in Polish Literature, Language and History. Presented on theOccasionof His 65thBirthday.Ed. Viktor Erlich.The Hague:Mouton,1975. 493-503.

Tayib, Abdulla El. "Pre-Islamic Poetry," Arabic Literature to the End of the Umayyad Period.Eds. A.F.L. Beeston, T.M. Johnstone,R.B. Serjeant,G.R. Smith.Cambridge:Cam-bridgeUP, 1983.22-111.Uziqbto,Gerard."Kilka t6wo orientalilmieAdama Mickiewicza."Ateneum Warszawa)(1889):132-143.Watt, W. Montgomery. The Influence of Islam on Medieval Europe. Edinburgh: EdinburghUP, 1972.Wilkins,Ernest."TheInventionof the Sonnet."ModernPhilology13(1915):463-95.Wysiouch, Seweryna. "O malarskosci Sonet6w krymskich." Ksiega Mickiewiczowska. Ed. Z.Trojanowiczowa, . Przychodniak. oznaii:Wydawnictwo aukoweUAM, 1998.35-51.Zajaczkowski, Ananiasz. Orientjako zrodto inspiracjiw literaturzeromantycznej doby mickie-wiczowskiej.Warszawa: aiistwowy nstytutWydawniczy,955.Zgorzelski, Czestaw. O lirykach Mickiewicza i Slowackiego: Eseje i studia. Lublin: Towarzy-stwo NaukoweKUL, 1961.

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LanguagesThe Sonnet, The Sequence, The Qasidah