The Doll (124 page)

The door opened a second time.

‘Mr Łęcki is asking for you, sir,' said Klein, revealing one cuff and the top of his head.

Wokulski started. Suzin rose heavily from the sofa.

‘Well, Stanisław Piotrowicz, I will go now and sleep awhile. Drop everything, I advise you, and go with me today to Paris; and if not today then tomorrow, or the day after. I'll stop off at Berlin on the way to take a look at Bismarck, and you join me …'

They embraced and Suzin left, shaking his head.

‘Where is Mr Łęcki?' Wokulski asked Klein.

‘In the study.'

‘I will go at once.'

Klein went out. Wokulski quickly gathered the papers from the table and also left Mr Ignacy's apartment.

Treaty of San Stefano
: Peace treaty between Russia and Turkey, signed on 3 March 1878. As a result, Romania, Serbia, Montenegro and Bulgaria — formerly parts of the Ottoman Empire — gained independence.

election of a new Pope
: Leo XIII, elected on 20 February 1878.

chances of a European war
: the political conflict between Britain and Russia, which arose during the Russo-Turkish war and was not entirely resolved after the treaty of San Stefano, posed the threat of a new war involving European powers.

Krakowskie Przedmieście
: one of the prime business and residential streets of Warsaw.

Beef Nelson
: a Polish speciality, beef in a rich mushroom sauce.

He and the rest of 'em
…
Irkutsk
: Prus alludes here to Wokulski's participation in the January Uprising, 1863–4, and Wokulski's presence in Irkutsk (Siberia) suggests political exile following the collapse of the uprising — the fate of many Polish insurgents and patriots at the time.

Napoleon III
: Louis Napoleon Bonaparte, born 1803, a nephew of Napoleon I; in 1848 elected President of the French Republic; in 1851 assumed a dictatorial position in the state; in 1852, after a popular referendum, assumed the title of Emperor. In 1870, after the lost war with Prussia, Napoleon III was deprived of his throne and exiled to England, where he died in 1873.

Huguenots
: opera by G. Meyerbeer (1836).

History of the Consulate and Empire
: a history of the rule of Napoleon Bonaparte in France by A. Thiers, published 1845–62.

the Italian war of 1859
: the war between the Kingdom of Sardinia (supported by France) and Austria; a vital stage in the process of the unification of Italy.

Rakoczi March
: a patriotic Hungarian march.

a Napoleon has turned up
: the reference here is to Louis Napoleon's attempted
coup d'état
in 1840.

The new Napoleon has been thrown into prison
: Louis Napoleon's
coup d'état
of 1840 proved unsuccessful. He was taken prisoner, sentenced to life imprisonment and on 7 October 1840 placed in the fortress of Ham in Northern France.
Cham
is Polish for ‘cad'.

Schublade
: the Polish word for ‘drawer' is
szuflada
, so Frau Mincel explains that
Schublade
means
szuflada
.

Andrássy
: Count Julius Andrassy (1823–90), a prominent figure in the 1848 Hungarian revolution against Austrian rule. Andrassy became Prime Minister of Hungary after the formation of the Dual Monarchy in 1867.

a Turkish Wallenrod
: an allusion to a long poem by Adam Mickiewicz,
Konrad Wallenrod
(1828). The poem tells the story of the medieval Lithuanians' struggle against the Teutonic Knights. The hero, Konrad Wallenrod, a Lithuanian, joins the ranks of the Teutonic Knights and works his way up to the position of Grand Master, only to orchestrate their defeat. The implication is that Wokulski, as a Pole driven by patriotic motives, had some hidden agenda of undermining Russian success while supplying the Russian military in the Russo-Turkish War.

Fifteen years ago
: an allusion to the year 1863 — the date of the abortive Polish uprising in which Wokulski participated.

Un-Divine Comedy
: a Romantic play by Count Zygmunt Krasiński (1835). The play paints a catastrophic vision of the future bloodshed between the old aristocracy and the rebellious masses. In it, the Holy Trinity Fortress (a historic site in the Ukraine) is the last place on earth defended by the desperate aristocrats against the victorious, barbaric rebellion.

R
epenting the enthusiasm of his youth
: another allusion to Wokulski's penal exile to Siberia after the defeat of the Polish uprising of 1863.

Czerski, Czekanowski, Dybowski
: eminent Polish scholars exiled to Siberia after the Uprising of 1863. During their time in exile they conducted geographic, geological, biological and anthropological studies of Siberia.

The years 1846 and 1847 … people disappeared
: the years 1846–7 brought an escalation of the activities of the Polish clandestine liberation movement against the powers occupying Polish territory. A general uprising was planned for 1846 in all three parts of Poland, occupied respectively by Russia, Prussia and Austria. In the event, uprisings took place in the Prussian and Austrian parts, while the wave of arrests and repressions by the Russian authorities prevented any further developments in the Russian part.

Our journey … October 1849
: in 1848, about four thousand young Poles left the Russian-occupied part of Polish territory to take part in the so-called Springtime of Nations. About two thousand of them fought against Austria for the independence of Hungary. After the defeat of the Hungarian uprising, many of them emigrated to the United States, England and Turkey.

General Bem
: Józef Bem (1797–1850), a Polish general; a participant of the Polish uprising against Russia in 1831; in 1848–9, the commander of the revolutionary forces in Vienna; later, the commander of the Hungarian insurgents in Transylvania and, in August 1849, the commander-in-chief of the Hungarian army. After the defeat of the Hungarian uprising he emigrated to Turkey.

Haynau
: Julius Haynau (1786–1853): Austrian field marshal who quelled the Hungarian uprising in 1849.

Kossuth
: Lájos Kossuth (1802–94): Hungarian politician and leader of the 1848–9 uprising.

I stayed over a year in Zamość
: Zamość was the site of a large Russian prison. Prus indirectly indicates that Rzecki served a year as a political prisoner after his return to the Russian-occupied part of Poland.

Nalewki or Świętojerska
: streets in Warsaw's Jewish neighbourhood.

prikashchiki
: Russian salesmen.

Citadel prison
: Russian political prison in Warsaw, built in 1832–40. The area around the Citadel prison was also known for its numerous brothels.

Europejski Hotel
: then the most luxurious hotel in Warsaw, located on Krakowskie Przedmieście.

A Romantic of the pre-1863 kind, and a positivist of the '70s
: see the discussion of Romanticism and Positivism in the Introduction, p.xiii.

mundur
: Polish for ‘uniform'.

Halka
: an opera by Stanisław Moniuszko, first staged in Warsaw in 1858 and very popular in Poland.

at this moment I passed out
: the gathering in the cellars and the strange project championed by Leon, as well as the following changes in Wokulski's behaviour, seem to allude to Wokulski's participation in underground activities directly preceding the 1863 uprising.

Twardowski
: a character from a Polish legend: a nobleman who sold his soul to the devil in exchange for the devil's assistance during his life. On the way to hell, Twardowski managed to escape to the moon where he is believed to have lived ever since.

And thou shalt sit upon a fierce lion without fear, and ride on a huge dragon
: a quotation from the sixteenth-century Polish translation of Psalm XCI by Jan Kochanowski, Poland's foremost poet prior to the nineteenth century.

Moltke
: Helmuth Count von Moltke (1800–91), chief of the Parisian general staff and military architect of Prussia's victories in the wars with Denmark, Austria and France.

Matejko
: Jan Matejko (1838–93), the celebrated painter of large historic canvases which present glorious moments in Polish history.
The Battle of Grünwald
, the most famous of all Matejko's paintings, depicts the victory of the Polish-Lithuanian forces over the Teutonic Knights at Grünwald-Tannenberg in 1410.

the incident with Nobiling
: the assassination attempt against the German Emperor Wilhelm 1 on 2 June 1878. Wilhelm was wounded and temporarily abdicated in favour of his successor, Friedrich Wilhelm. He resumed the throne in December 1878.

shabash
: obsolete Russian expression meaning ‘that's enough!' or ‘that'll do!' In this context, ‘and there you are!' is closer to the intended meaning.

THIS IS A NEW YORK REVIEW BOOK

PUBLISHED BY THE NEW YORK REVIEW OF BOOKS

IN ASSOCIATION WITH CENTRAL EUROPEAN CLASSICS

New York Review Books

435 Hudson Street, New York, NY 10014

www.nyrb.com

Translation and notes © 1996 by Central European Classics Trust

Introduction © 1996 by Stanisław Barańczak

All rights reserved.

First published in Polish as
Lalka
, 1890

First published in English as
The Doll
by Twayne Publishers, Inc., New York, 1972

This edition first published by Central European University Press, 1996

Cover image: Antonio Manici,
Sylvia Hunter
, 1901–2; cover design: Katy Homans

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Prus, Boleslaw, 1847–1912.

[Lalka. English]

The doll/by Boleslaw Prus; introduction by Stanislaw Baranczak; translated by

David Welsh.

p.cm. — (New York Review Books classics)

1. Poland—Social conditions—19th century—Fiction. 2. Warsaw (Poland)—Social

life and customs—19th century—Fiction. 3. Social classes—Poland—Fiction.

I. Welsh, David J. II. Title.

PG7158.G6L323 2011

891.8'536—dc22

2010033548

eISBN 978-1-59017-397-8
v1.0

For a complete list of books in the NYRB Classics series, visit
www.nyrb.com
or write to:
Catalog Requests, NYRB, 435 Hudson Street, New York, NY 10014