SIENKIEWICZ, HENRYK. – Polish writer, b. at Wola Okrzejska on 6 May 1846, d. at Vévey on 15 Dec. 1916.
Of noble family, he lived on his father’s estates until completing his studies. He went to North America, visited France and Italy, and meanwhile published short stories, novels, and journalistic correspondence. He subsequently alternated stays in Warsaw with journeys to Turkey, Africa, Greece, Spain, and Italy. At the outbreak of the First World War, together with Paderewski, he established in Switzerland the Relief Committee for Poles, employing every means toward the liberation of his homeland.
S.’s literary work is vast and multifaceted, and won acclaim throughout the world. At the beginning of his career, during the period of positivism’s greatest flourishing, S. was influenced by it (No morne [In Vain] and various short stories). But romantic tradition soon attracted him; nostalgia for the life of the past pervades the delicate novella Hania; longing for his distant homeland in the heart of the exile inspired Latarnik (The Lighthouse Keeper), rightly considered a masterpiece. His first great work is the Trilogy, that is, the three novels in which Poland during the period between the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries comes to life, in the most turbulent era of its history: the Cossack war (Ogniem i mieczem [With Fire and Sword]), the Swedish invasion (Potop [The Deluge]), and the Tartar war (Pan Michal Wolodylowski). The grandeur of the action, in which people and warriors move; the figures drawn in full light; and the vividness of the narrative are admirable. The writer’s art appeared as one with his patriotism, of which he was to give so many proofs, fighting against the denationalization attempted in Posnania (Z pamiętnika poznańskiego na czyciela [From the Diary of a Teacher of Posnania]), and against the expropriation of lands likewise subjected to the Germans, whom the Poles had already fought in the time of the Teutonic Knights: this was the subject that would later inspire his novel Krzyżacy (The Crusaders).
After two novels on modern subjects, Rodzina Polanieckich (The P. Family) and Bez dogmatu ([Without Dogma], a ruthless analysis of the ruin brought about by the absence of moral principles), S. published Quo vadis? in 1896, a tale set in the time of Nero. The reason for the tremendous success achieved by Quo vadis?, which was translated into every language, lies in the conflict between opposing forces, paganism and Christianity at its origins; in the richness of life found in the historical characters and those created by the author’s imagination; in the beauty of the narrative; and in its highly religious spirit, despite the simple humanity of the plot.
S.’s later work is of lesser importance: Na polu chwaly (On the Field of Glory) is the only novel of a second trilogy he had planned. Wiry (Whirlwinds) concerns the Polish uprising of 1863; Legiony was left unfinished; only one work reaches the level of his finest: W pustyni i puszczy (Through Deserts and Forests), which belongs among the masterpieces of children’s literature. S.’s travel letters have also been published, including several from Italy, which he admired and loved. S.’s writings, admirable for their clarity and nobility of style, display a particular mastery of the language: fluid and lively when dealing with modern subjects, it has an archaic flavor on the lips of the characters of the Trilogy, who speak the historically documented Polish of the seventeenth century, and assumes classical beauty in Quo vadis?