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Ferdydurke

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"Ferdydurke" by Witold Gombrowicz has finally been properly translated into English. Not that this is an event worth mentioning in general, but the point to be made is that the world of translation offers room for all kinds of mischief and sloppiness. Who would have thought that it were perfectly acceptable for publishers to allow translation from a second, and not native tongue? Imagine, for purposes of illustration, that a work of a classic British author translated into German not directly, but from Suahili, for this was the language the book was first translated into. Would you be satisfied with a product of this type? This was the fate of Gombrowicz, his native tongue was done away with, and the Anglo-Saxon world of bibliophiles had had no other choice but to read a lemon. Perhaps this is the revenge of the Heavens on the author himself, for never was there any other Polish author who had his native country in such a low regard as he did. In his "Trans-Atlantyk", Gombrowicz dared to ridicule everything a Pole holds dear, together with the whole idea of a nation as such. Were he to live today, he would embrace the idea of convergence and the global village of consumptionism, as opposed to Europe of Nations. That was one of the main reasons for Gombrowicz's emigration to Argentina, where he spent almost all of his literary career.

"Ferdydurke" is an early novel by this author, and it's never as crass as the aforementioned "Trans-Atlantyk". In fact, it constitutes part of a literary canon in Poland to this very day, and there is no educated Pole who hasn't read or at least heard of "Ferdydurke". Scenes from this book, gestures, and neologisms entered the mass vocabulary, and once you learn some of these expressions, you cannot unlearn them, for then there is no better way to express yourself, but to use the phrases coined by Gombrowicz. Whatever issues Poles have with this author, one thing is certain: we are grateful to him for augmenting our language. Gombrowicz created an archetype of a confused man, whose karma is to move back in time, back to school, with the mentality of an adult. I will even risk a claim that this fact alone lies at the very heart of science fiction - for how might that be possible, and what would happen if such occurence took place? How would that affect the object in queestion? Perhaps my perception of this problem is a bit skewed due to my occupational hazard of a scientist, but for me, "Ferdydurke" is a laboratory novel, where with a literary set of tools we analyze both the situation, and the object, in the vein of the medieval alchemist. This novel, hardly known in the English-speaking world, will be an exhilarating reading experience for you, provided that you will trust me and pick it up. The amusing analysis of the immature world the protagonist found himself in, mixed with elements from all literary forms, from plain mystery, via comedy, to sophisticated analysis of society, makes Ferdydurke an experimental novel of potential interest for all bibliophiles and lovers of the nonstandard.

The world of Ferdydurke seems at first to be concocted out of equal parts of Kafka and Swift. There is the absurdity of Kakfa: events occur for no apparent reason, and the main character seems to be under some mysterious hypnotic spell. And there is the savage humor of Swift. Violent conflict erupts between the followers of two opposed and equally absurd and ridiculous systems of belief. But as the book progresses, it becomes clear that Gombrowicz has put his own special stamp on this world, and created a type of fiction that is totally unique.

The plot line is simple: a man of about 30 years of age is abducted by a priggish professor and finds himself, for reasons unexplained, transformed into an adolescent schoolboy. The novel consists of the "adventures" of this anti-hero in the world of adolescence, which he views with both fascination and disgust, and from which he remains detached, and yet at the same time with which he becomes intensely involved. (Ferdydurke is above all else a novel of unresolved contradictions.) Although the narrator is subjected to all the humiliations of an adolescent schoolboy (patronized by adults, frustrated by hopeless desire for a girl who disdains him, etc.), he also retains an adult outlook. In fact, it may be said that he is the only character who is adult (in the psychological sense of being self-aware) and who struggles, not always with success, to remain sane. Part of the genius of the book is that the adults in it seem crazy from the narrator's perspective as a youth, and the adolescents seem crazy from the narrator's perspective as an adult. In spite of its simple plot, Ferdydurke bursts with a dazzling exuberance of incidents, contradictions, characters, and digressions. Readers who demand strict linear plot development in a novel should probably look elsewhere.

Ferdydurke can be read at many levels. It is not surprising that a novel which features conflicts between two equally absurd systems should come out of 1930s Poland, beset as it was by two powerful opposed enemies, Nazi Germany and Soviet Russia. Ferdydurke can also be read as an exploration of the fragility of the adult ego, of the fine line between "maturity" and "immaturity". The violent schoolboy quarrels which so fascinate and repel the narrator seem like absurdist, distorted parodies of very serious adult matters. And this novel is also about hidden, dark passageways in the human psyche. The narrator confesses to thoughts and behavior that most of us would never want to allow into the daylight of consciousness, much less to own up to.

Ferdydurke is not a difficult read, but it is quite digressive and very different from what most English-speakers expect a novel to be. Until this new translation, the first directly into English, it was effectively unavailable. This book is not for everyone. But it is a fascinating read for those who are seeking a multi-faceted, complex, and uncompromising (one noted critic has called it "Nietzchean") exploration of what it means to be a "mature adult", and who are not looking for easy answers or Hollywood endings.

Ferdydurke is out of print! It has been a battle to get this book openly published in Poland, but look at how English-speaking consumers conduct their own censorship scheme. Yet there is a touch of Anglo-Saxon to the novel's madness: the upper class school boys, the title borrowed from the netherlands of H.G.Wells' corpus and much, much more. The novel questions whether there is such a thing as maturity, sending its main character back to school as an adult, where he is among boys who treat him as another boy (as does everyone else!). It also asks one of the great questions of our time: our characters are made by others; is it possible to escape this or are we merely prisoners of other people's influences? Something for us living under states who idolize individual choice to think about. But Gombrowicz's book is also full of comedy: slapstick, sharp irony, plot twists and philosophical fables. Jokes are used as an ideal way to pose serious questions. Furthermore, in its giant bums and staring contests it shows how much more you can talk about reality, including prudent insights into totalitarian life, through wild fantasy. The experiments of the novel - the unique fantasy, the invasion of the author and the symmetrical interjections - put it at the heart of European modernism. It is a landmark, albeit buttock-shaped.

Having tolerated, in my college years, the English translation of the French translation of the original Polish novel, I must say that reading this new direct translation into English was a sublime experience. I highly recommend this book to my intellectual and therapist friends/colleagues alike, for it highlights the common struggle between maturity and immaturity. It defuses most of the usual interpretations by those who are hopelessly married to a single interpretive theory. It also should be required reading for those folks "into" Queer Studies, as Gombrowicz, in this novel, wrestles with his own (later documented) homosexuality. In brief, this is one of the great unsung 20th-century novels.

The task is to evaluate and to assess, and to decide whether the work is a novel, or a book of memoirs, or a parody, or a lampoon, or a variation on imaginative themes, or a psychological study; and to establish its predominant characteristics; whether the whole thing is a joke, or whether its importance lies in its deeper meaning, or whether it is just irony, sarcasm, ridicule, invective, downright stupidity and nonsense, or a piece of pure leg-pulling; and, moreover, to make sure that it is not just a pose, a piece of mystification, a fraud, or the result of a total lack of humour, a total deficiency of feeling or atrophy of the imagination, a collapse of all sense of order, and a total loss of reason. But the sum-total of all these possibilities, torments, descriptions and parts is so vast, so incommensurable, so inconceivable and, what is more, so inexhaustible, that, with the most profound respect for the Word, and after the most scrupulous analysis, it must be admitted that we are no wiser than when we began, cluck! cluck! cluck! as the chicken said. So I invite those who wish to plunge still deeper and get a still better idea of what it is all about to turn to the first page and read Ferdydurke, for its mysterious symbolism contains the answer to all tormenting questions

This highly inventive novel captures readers within the first few pages with its vivid and personal descriptions of the tormented, pretentious, and hilarious mind of the writer (read "artiste") protagonist. Those who have felt caught between the worlds of adolesence and adulthood and those who have wondered why we bother to call art "Art" will find a comrade in arms in this author. His ability to peel away at human pretense and expose the inherent absurdity of life is both ruthless and gentle. The scenarios he builds are profoundly implausible but uncannily truthful reflections of the essential human condition. A must read for lovers of surrealist masterpieces -- like "The Master and Margarita" or "Love in the Time of Cholera".

This book is absolutely brilliant! Gombrowicz has a gift for concealing philosophical discourse beneath a layer of satirical wit and absurdity. His larger than life characters drag you along on a mad ride through the subtle twists of Polish class consciousness, all the while spouting witicisms on the insanity of the human condition. I started learning Polish because of this book. I consider it a must read.

Better late than never! Had this exquisite translation of Ferdydurke been published in the thirties, the Art of today would be radically different. It is comforting to see that, after so many years, the English-speaking reader will have a chance to relish the wittiest and the 'najbardziej wariackie' (craziest) work of the early 20th century European literature and philosophy. A careful reader of Ferdydurke, before she gets a 'pupa', will be able to appreciate the acumen and originality of Gombrowicz's thought only much later developed by Sartre and Camus.....

I have read this book a couple of years ago. As it seems in some other Gombrowitz's texts the relationship between the childish and mature feelings is investigated: cruelty vs. subtlety, raw vs. refined. Imagine a thirty year old is placed in a school with 10 year olds, how does he act? (similar situation in one of Kundera's novels)

The language even in translation is beautiful, woven with sarcasm, irony and absurdity, it is a most delightful and intriguing investigation of those feeling one can characterize as immature. To all those of us who are still prone to excesses in feelings, and a taste for absurdity, this is a wonderful reference

Read Gombrowicz's "Diary." I've read only Part 1 of that series, but I'm satisfied that it's a monument of 20th century writing and a work of great humanity. As to "Ferdydurke," it suffers from the same malady as "Candide," its avowed inspiration: rather thin in writing quality, uneven in its satiric force, too much of a polemic to be involving. "Candide" and its progenitors like "Gulliver's Travels" get their power from the truths they demonstrate, the persistence of the philosophic errors and solecisms they lampoon. (In Swift's case, I think his passion comes through and carries "Travels" to another level) By that token, many of Gombrowicz's targets are relics of the past (e.g., Polish culture's then-overemphasis on "adult" virtues, something nonexistent in our own youth-worshipping culture), as he himself later confessed. "Ferdydurke" is a modernist satire to be read by serious students of 20th c. European literature, but while its innovative form engages the intellect it doesn't go beyond to plumb any depths of human experience. I would submit there is simply not enough of Gombrowicz in this effort, or a too-young edition of the man.

Great works of literature have always happily immersed me beyond my intellectual grasp, either to present me with a situation with too many parts to rationally connect or with an author too complex to safely encapsulate. And at the same time resonate with my own experience of the world. It could be that "Trans-Atlantik" accomplishes this; the "Diary" certainly does; but "Ferdydurke"--in spite of Sontag calling it a "masterpiece" and "wonderful" in her introduction--does not.

That said, there is an analysis here of master-servant relations that made me very happy I'd read the book. Never mind the enforced goofiness and satirical extravagances throughout, there is a description in the second half of the book of relations between country squires and servants, between the traditional two classes, as nuanced and observant and analytically sound (absolutely convincing in its psychological penetration) as could be imagined. Not only was the description convincing as it related to centuries of ingrained attitudes, it went to, goes to, dominant/subordinant relations wherever they are found--and of course they are still found, democracies to the contrary notwithstanding. Nobody had brought it home to me before as effectively as Gombrowicz. The examination here is subtle enough as almost to throw his deft satire out of whack, as if he needed a bigger canvas with fewer self-imposed stylistic restrictions. The "Diary" was later to provide just such a canvas.

Parenthetically, Gombrowicz himself would find it amusing that negative reviews here and elsewhere on Amazon, no matter how detailed and nuanced, always garner fewer numbers of "helpful" votes than the ecstatic ones ("8 of 29 people found the following review helpful"). Expectant readers want to have their hopes justified. Thus are greased the wheels of literary commerce.