Banquet at Countess Kotłubaj's

"A banquet at Countess Kotłubaj" by Gombrowicz (published for the first time in 1933 in an early volume of short stories" A Diary from Adolescence ") today tastes the way cauliflower tastes in various parts of the world today. Aromatic and deliciously tasty, while in Iceland or California, nourished with fertilizers and cut while still immature, it can only offer consumptive blushes and watery taste. such as: white eagle "or the name of Prince Józef Poniatowski do not arouse patriotic emotions, and where the idea of ​​renunciation is not as obvious (in the era of the prevailing vegetarianism!) as in the Catholic custom of Lent Fridays. Despite this kind of insufficiency, the author's talent leaves many tastes undisturbed in this feast. The contrast of the aspirations of the young man from the lower sphere is intensified by the ecstatic vision of the aristocracy, when confronted with the triviality of her life, it becomes a touchstone of attitudes and acts as the effect of a crooked mirror. The sensational motif of a starved peasant - Bolek Cauliflower, by the name coinciding with the name of the main dish of the feast, increases the dramatic tension and adds an element of horror (thus exposing the cruelty of aristocrats). Gombrowicz's grotesque can also be interpreted as a preview or a sketch for the later drama "Ivona, Princess of Burgundia", in which, like the Narrator in Countess Kotłubaj's salon, Iwona - sloppy, apathetic and fearful, stirs up decay and decay at the royal court. But these are the most poisonous flavors of Countess Kotłubaj's cauliflower banquet ". Anna Krajewska - Wieczorek