- Info
Katarzyna Nadana-Sokołowska
Instytut Badań Literackich PAN (Warsaw, Poland)
Katarzyna Nadana-Sokołowska, PhD
position: adjunct, a member of “Archiwum kobiet” scientific team.
“I'm not a feminist, but I'm a... witch”? – new identity figure of Polish women in post-1989 literature and in socio-public life
In my presentation, I would like to put the thesis that the figure of a witch is now, in 2020-21, a surprisingly important point of reference for identity of many Polish women. It is also confirmed by the last Women's Strike demonstrations (autumn 2020), in which slogans which connect the protest to the figure of a witch (“We are daughters of the witches you didn't manage to burn”, “You won't burn all of us”). I would like to follow and describe the stages of this identification. Literature written by women since the 1990s (Chwała Czarownicom by Krystyna Kofta, Prawiek i inne czasy, Dom dzienny, dom nocny, Prowadź mój pług przez kości umarłych by Olga Tokarczuk, Ciemno, prawie noc by Joanna Bator) has been reintepretating the witch myth. It started to understand it not as a traditional symbol of evil, but as an ambiguous figure from cultural margin, who rebels against the values in force in the name of empathy towards the excluded and harmed. Independent women, single by choice, often eccentric and in many ways not conforming to scripts of life which are foreseen for women, has become common literary protagonists. The same myth is being worked on since the 1990s – in a different way – among women involved in some forms of therapy (particularly Jungian). A particularly visible phenomenon is gathering in “women's circles” with a scope of celebrating women's union (sisterhood), rebuilding the female identity as mutilated by patriarchy and strengthening its positive manifestations. Although the portraits of witch created by Kofta, Tokarczuk, Bator and others are – as I intent to show – interesting and original, in historical perspective it is striking how the reinterpretation of the figure of a witch both by important contemporary writers and in therapeutic-developmental circles clearly refers to reinterpretations of the myth of a witch which were a feature of second-wave feminism in the USA (Mary Daly, Starhawk etc.).The reinterpreted witch is a “woman of power”, strongly tied to Nature and drawing deeper knowledge and wisdom from this source, wiedźma [the knowing woman], fostering and caring towards life (and ready to use her power in defense of those who are weaker in the patriarchal system – a rebel). At the same time she is filled with femininity (beautiful beyond traditional notions of beauty, celebrating her sexuality, fertility and creativity).
Given how Polish women were traditionally reluctant to identify with feminism, it is surprising how willing they are now to identify with the figure of a “witch”, which evidently has much in common with the feminist. Therefore, I will attempt to diagnose this phenomenon and to consider what connects and what distinguishes “feminists” and “witches” in Polish women's awareness nowadays.