Aleksander Głowacki (20 August 1847 – 19 May 1912), better known by his
pen name
A pen name or nom-de-plume is a pseudonym (or, in some cases, a variant form of a real name) adopted by an author and printed on the title page or by-line of their works in place of their real name.
A pen name may be used to make the author's na ...
Bolesław Prus (), was a Polish journalist, novelist, a leading figure in the history of
Polish literature
Polish literature is the literary tradition of Poland. Most Polish literature has been written in the Polish language, though other languages used in Poland over the centuries have also contributed to Polish literary traditions, including Latin, ...
and
philosophy
Philosophy ('love of wisdom' in Ancient Greek) is a systematic study of general and fundamental questions concerning topics like existence, reason, knowledge, Value (ethics and social sciences), value, mind, and language. It is a rational an ...
, and a distinctive voice in
world literature
World literature is used to refer to the world's total national literature and the circulation of works into the wider world beyond their country of origin. In the past, it primarily referred to the masterpieces of Western European literature. ...
.
Aged 15, Aleksander Głowacki joined the Polish
1863 Uprising against
Imperial Russia
Imperial is that which relates to an empire, emperor/empress, or imperialism.
Imperial or The Imperial may also refer to:
Places
United States
* Imperial, California
* Imperial, Missouri
* Imperial, Nebraska
* Imperial, Pennsylvania
* ...
. Shortly after his 16th birthday, he suffered severe battle injuries. Five months later, he was imprisoned. These early experiences may have precipitated the
panic disorder
Panic disorder is a mental disorder, specifically an anxiety disorder, characterized by reoccurring unexpected panic attacks. Panic attacks are sudden periods of intense fear that may include palpitations, sweating, shaking, shortness of breath ...
and
agoraphobia
Agoraphobia is an anxiety disorder characterized by symptoms of anxiety in situations where the person perceives their environment to be unsafe with no way to escape. These situations can include public transit, shopping centers, crowds and q ...
that dogged him through life, and shaped his opposition to seeking Poland's independence by force of arms.
In 1872, in
Warsaw
Warsaw, officially the Capital City of Warsaw, is the capital and List of cities and towns in Poland, largest city of Poland. The metropolis stands on the Vistula, River Vistula in east-central Poland. Its population is officially estimated at ...
, aged 25, he settled into a 40-year journalistic career that focused on science, technology, education, and economic and cultural development – societal enterprises essential to the perseverance of a people who in the 18th century had been
partitioned out of political existence by Russia, Prussia, and Austria. Głowacki took the
pen name
A pen name or nom-de-plume is a pseudonym (or, in some cases, a variant form of a real name) adopted by an author and printed on the title page or by-line of their works in place of their real name.
A pen name may be used to make the author's na ...
for his popular writings, "''Prus''", from the appellation of his family's
coat-of-arms
A coat of arms is a heraldic visual design on an escutcheon (i.e., shield), surcoat, or tabard (the last two being outer garments), originating in Europe. The coat of arms on an escutcheon forms the central element of the full heraldic achiev ...
.
As a sideline, he wrote short stories. Achieving success, he proceeded to a larger canvas: between 1884 and 1895, he completed four major novels: ''
The Outpost'', ''
The Doll'', ''
The New Woman'', and ''
Pharaoh
Pharaoh (, ; Egyptian language, Egyptian: ''wikt:pr ꜥꜣ, pr ꜥꜣ''; Meroitic language, Meroitic: 𐦲𐦤𐦧, ; Biblical Hebrew: ''Parʿō'') was the title of the monarch of ancient Egypt from the First Dynasty of Egypt, First Dynasty ( ...
''. ''The Doll'' depicts the romantic infatuation of a man of action who is frustrated by his country's backwardness. ''Pharaoh'', his only historical novel, is a study of
politics
Politics () is the set of activities that are associated with decision-making, making decisions in social group, groups, or other forms of power (social and political), power relations among individuals, such as the distribution of Social sta ...
, set in
ancient Egypt
Ancient Egypt () was a cradle of civilization concentrated along the lower reaches of the Nile River in Northeast Africa. It emerged from prehistoric Egypt around 3150BC (according to conventional Egyptian chronology), when Upper and Lower E ...
at the fall of its
20th Dynasty and
New Kingdom
New or NEW may refer to:
Music
* New, singer of K-pop group The Boyz
* ''New'' (album), by Paul McCartney, 2013
** "New" (Paul McCartney song), 2013
* ''New'' (EP), by Regurgitator, 1995
* "New" (Daya song), 2017
* "New" (No Doubt song), 1 ...
.
Life
Early years
Aleksander Głowacki was born 20 August 1847 in
Hrubieszów
Hrubieszów (; ; , or ) is a town in southeastern Poland, with a population of around 18,212 (2016). It is the capital of Hrubieszów County within the Lublin Voivodeship.
Throughout history, the town's culture and architecture was strongly shaped ...
, now in southeastern Poland, very near the present-day border with
Ukraine
Ukraine is a country in Eastern Europe. It is the List of European countries by area, second-largest country in Europe after Russia, which Russia–Ukraine border, borders it to the east and northeast. Ukraine also borders Belarus to the nor ...
. The town was then in the Russian-controlled sector of partitioned Poland, known as the "
Congress Kingdom
Congress Poland or Congress Kingdom of Poland, formally known as the Kingdom of Poland, was a polity created in 1815 by the Congress of Vienna as a semi-autonomous Polish state, a successor to Napoleon's Duchy of Warsaw. It was established w ...
". Aleksander was the younger son of Antoni Głowacki, an estate steward at the village of
Żabcze, in
Hrubieszów County
__NOTOC__
Hrubieszów County () is a unit of territorial administration and local government (powiat) in Lublin Voivodeship, eastern Poland, on the border with Ukraine. It was established on January 1, 1999, as a result of the Polish local governme ...
, and Apolonia Głowacka (
née
The birth name is the name of the person given upon their birth. The term may be applied to the surname, the given name or to the entire name. Where births are required to be officially registered, the entire name entered onto a births registe ...
Trembińska).
In 1850, when the future ''Bolesław Prus'' was three years old, his mother died; the child was placed in the care of his maternal grandmother, Marcjanna Trembińska of
Puławy
Puławy (, also written Pulawy) is a city in eastern Poland, in Lesser Poland's Lublin Voivodeship, at the confluence of the Vistula and Kurówka River, Kurówka Rivers. Puławy is the capital of Puławy County. The city's 2019 population was Cen ...
, and, four years later, in the care of his aunt, Domicela Olszewska of
Lublin
Lublin is List of cities and towns in Poland, the ninth-largest city in Poland and the second-largest city of historical Lesser Poland. It is the capital and the centre of Lublin Voivodeship with a population of 336,339 (December 2021). Lublin i ...
. In 1856 Prus was
orphan
An orphan is a child whose parents have died, are unknown, or have permanently abandoned them. It can also refer to a child who has lost only one parent, as the Hebrew language, Hebrew translation, for example, is "fatherless". In some languages ...
ed by his father's death and, aged 9, began attending a Lublin primary school whose principal, Józef Skłodowski, grandfather of the future double
Nobel laureate
The Nobel Prizes (, ) are awarded annually by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, the Swedish Academy, the Karolinska Institutet, and the Norwegian Nobel Committee to individuals and organizations who make outstanding contributions in th ...
Maria Skłodowska-Curie,
administered canings (a customary mode of disciplining) to wayward pupils, including the spirited Aleksander.
In 1862, Prus's brother, Leon, a teacher thirteen years his senior, took him to
Siedlce
Siedlce () ( ) is a city in the Masovian Voivodeship in eastern Poland with 77,354 inhabitants ().
The city is situated between two small rivers, the Muchawka and the Helenka, and lies along the European route E30, around east of Warsaw. It is ...
, then to
Kielce
Kielce (; ) is a city in south-central Poland and the capital of the Świętokrzyskie Voivodeship. In 2021, it had 192,468 inhabitants. The city is in the middle of the Świętokrzyskie Mountains (Holy Cross Mountains), on the banks of the Silnic ...
.
Soon after the outbreak of the Polish
January 1863 Uprising against
Imperial Russia
Imperial is that which relates to an empire, emperor/empress, or imperialism.
Imperial or The Imperial may also refer to:
Places
United States
* Imperial, California
* Imperial, Missouri
* Imperial, Nebraska
* Imperial, Pennsylvania
* ...
, 15-year-old Prus ran away from school to join the insurgents.
[Pieścikowski, Edward, ''Bolesław Prus'', p. 147.] He may have been influenced by his brother Leon, one of the Uprising's leaders. Leon, during a June 1863 mission to Wilno (now
Vilnius
Vilnius ( , ) is the capital of and List of cities in Lithuania#Cities, largest city in Lithuania and the List of cities in the Baltic states by population, most-populous city in the Baltic states. The city's estimated January 2025 population w ...
) in
Lithuania
Lithuania, officially the Republic of Lithuania, is a country in the Baltic region of Europe. It is one of three Baltic states and lies on the eastern shore of the Baltic Sea, bordered by Latvia to the north, Belarus to the east and south, P ...
for the Polish insurgent government, developed a debilitating mental illness that would end only with his death in 1907.
On 1 September 1863, twelve days after his sixteenth birthday, Prus took part in a battle against Russian forces at a village called Białka, four kilometers south of
Siedlce
Siedlce () ( ) is a city in the Masovian Voivodeship in eastern Poland with 77,354 inhabitants ().
The city is situated between two small rivers, the Muchawka and the Helenka, and lies along the European route E30, around east of Warsaw. It is ...
. He suffered
contusion
A bruise, also known as a contusion, is a type of hematoma of tissue, the most common cause being capillaries damaged by trauma, causing localized bleeding that extravasates into the surrounding interstitial tissues. Most bruises occur clo ...
s to the neck and
gunpowder
Gunpowder, also commonly known as black powder to distinguish it from modern smokeless powder, is the earliest known chemical explosive. It consists of a mixture of sulfur, charcoal (which is mostly carbon), and potassium nitrate, potassium ni ...
injuries to his eyes, and was captured unconscious on the battlefield and taken to hospital in Siedlce.
This experience may have caused his subsequent lifelong
agoraphobia
Agoraphobia is an anxiety disorder characterized by symptoms of anxiety in situations where the person perceives their environment to be unsafe with no way to escape. These situations can include public transit, shopping centers, crowds and q ...
.
Five months later, in early February 1864, Prus was arrested and imprisoned at
Lublin Castle
The Lublin Castle () is a medieval castle in Lublin, Poland, adjacent to the Old Town district and close to the city center. It is one of the oldest preserved royal residencies in Poland, initially established by High Duke Casimir II the Just. It ...
for his role in the Uprising. In early April a military court sentenced him to forfeiture of his nobleman's status and resettlement on imperial lands. On 30 April, however, the Lublin District military head credited Prus's time spent under arrest and, on account of the 16-year-old's youth, decided to place him in the custody of his uncle Klemens Olszewski. On 7 May, Prus was released and entered the household of Katarzyna Trembińska, a relative and the mother of his future wife, Oktawia Trembińska.
Prus enrolled at a
Lublin
Lublin is List of cities and towns in Poland, the ninth-largest city in Poland and the second-largest city of historical Lesser Poland. It is the capital and the centre of Lublin Voivodeship with a population of 336,339 (December 2021). Lublin i ...
''
gymnasium'' (
secondary school
A secondary school, high school, or senior school, is an institution that provides secondary education. Some secondary schools provide both ''lower secondary education'' (ages 11 to 14) and ''upper secondary education'' (ages 14 to 18), i.e., b ...
), the still functioning prestigious
Stanisław Staszic School, founded in 1586. Graduating on 30 June 1866, at nineteen he matriculated in the
Warsaw University Department of Mathematics and Physics.
In 1868, poverty forced him to break off his university studies.
In 1869, he enrolled in the Forestry Department at the newly opened Agriculture and Forestry Institute in
Puławy
Puławy (, also written Pulawy) is a city in eastern Poland, in Lesser Poland's Lublin Voivodeship, at the confluence of the Vistula and Kurówka River, Kurówka Rivers. Puławy is the capital of Puławy County. The city's 2019 population was Cen ...
, a historic town where he had spent some of his childhood and which, 15 years later, was the setting for his striking 1884
micro-story, "
Mold of the Earth", comparing
human history
Human history or world history is the record of humankind from prehistory to the present. Early modern human, Modern humans evolved in Africa around 300,000 years ago and initially lived as hunter-gatherers. They Early expansions of hominin ...
with the mutual aggressions of blind, mindless colonies of molds that cover a boulder adjacent to the
Temple of the Sibyl. In January 1870, after only three months at the institute, Prus was expelled for his insufficient deference toward the martinet Russian-language instructor.
Henceforth he studied on his own while supporting himself mainly as a tutor. As part of his program of self-education, he translated and summarized
John Stuart Mill
John Stuart Mill (20 May 1806 – 7 May 1873) was an English philosopher, political economist, politician and civil servant. One of the most influential thinkers in the history of liberalism and social liberalism, he contributed widely to s ...
's ''
A System of Logic''.
In 1872, he embarked on a career as a newspaper
columnist
A columnist is a person who writes for publication in a series, creating an article that usually offers commentary and opinions. Column (periodical), Columns appear in newspapers, magazines and other publications, including blogs. They take the ...
, while working several months at the
Evans, Lilpop and Rau Machine and Agricultural Implement Works in Warsaw.
In 1873, Prus delivered two public lectures which illustrate the breadth of his scientific interests: "On the Structure of the Universe", and "
On Discoveries and Inventions."
Columnist

As a newspaper
columnist
A columnist is a person who writes for publication in a series, creating an article that usually offers commentary and opinions. Column (periodical), Columns appear in newspapers, magazines and other publications, including blogs. They take the ...
, Prus commented on the achievements of scholars and scientists such as
John Stuart Mill
John Stuart Mill (20 May 1806 – 7 May 1873) was an English philosopher, political economist, politician and civil servant. One of the most influential thinkers in the history of liberalism and social liberalism, he contributed widely to s ...
,
Charles Darwin
Charles Robert Darwin ( ; 12 February 1809 – 19 April 1882) was an English Natural history#Before 1900, naturalist, geologist, and biologist, widely known for his contributions to evolutionary biology. His proposition that all speci ...
,
Alexander Bain,
Herbert Spencer
Herbert Spencer (27 April 1820 – 8 December 1903) was an English polymath active as a philosopher, psychologist, biologist, sociologist, and anthropologist. Spencer originated the expression "survival of the fittest", which he coined in '' ...
and
Henry Thomas Buckle
Henry Thomas Buckle (24 November 1821 – 29 May 1862) was an English historian, the author of an unfinished ''History of Civilization'' and a strong amateur chess player. He is sometimes called "the Father of Scientific History".
Early life a ...
;
urged Poles to study science and technology and to develop industry and commerce;
[Krystyna Tokarzówna and Stanisław Fita, ''Bolesław Prus, 1847–1912: Kalendarz życia i twórczości'' (Bolesław Prus, 1847–1912: A Calendar of His Life and Work), ''passim''.] encouraged the establishment of
charitable institutions to benefit the underprivileged;
described the fiction and nonfiction works of fellow writers such as
H. G. Wells
Herbert George Wells (21 September 1866 – 13 August 1946) was an English writer, prolific in many genres. He wrote more than fifty novels and dozens of short stories. His non-fiction output included works of social commentary, politics, hist ...
;
and extolled man-made and natural wonders such as the
Wieliczka Salt Mine,
an 1887
solar eclipse
A solar eclipse occurs when the Moon passes between Earth and the Sun, thereby obscuring the view of the Sun from a small part of Earth, totally or partially. Such an alignment occurs approximately every six months, during the eclipse season i ...
that he witnessed at
Mława
Mława (; ''Mlave'') is a town in north-eastern Poland with 30,403 inhabitants in 2020. It is the capital of Mława County. It is situated in the Masovian Voivodeship.
During the invasion of Poland in 1939, the battle of Mława was fought to the ...
,
planned building of the
Eiffel Tower
The Eiffel Tower ( ; ) is a wrought-iron lattice tower on the Champ de Mars in Paris, France. It is named after the engineer Gustave Eiffel, whose company designed and built the tower from 1887 to 1889.
Locally nicknamed "''La dame de fe ...
for the
1889 Paris Exposition, and
Nałęczów
Nałęczów is a spa town (population 4,800) situated on the Nałęczów Plateau in Puławy County, Lublin Voivodeship, eastern Poland. Nałęczów belongs to Lesser Poland.
History
In the 18th century, the discovery there of healing waters ini ...
, where he vacationed for 30 years.
His "Weekly Chronicles" spanned forty years (they have since been reprinted in twenty volumes) and helped prepare the ground for the 20th-century blossoming of Polish
science
Science is a systematic discipline that builds and organises knowledge in the form of testable hypotheses and predictions about the universe. Modern science is typically divided into twoor threemajor branches: the natural sciences, which stu ...
and especially
mathematics
Mathematics is a field of study that discovers and organizes methods, Mathematical theory, theories and theorems that are developed and Mathematical proof, proved for the needs of empirical sciences and mathematics itself. There are many ar ...
. "Our national life," wrote Prus, "will take a normal course only when we have become a useful, indispensable element of civilization, when we have become able to give nothing for free and to demand nothing for free."
The social importance of science and technology recurred as a theme in his novels ''
The Doll'' (1889) and ''
Pharaoh
Pharaoh (, ; Egyptian language, Egyptian: ''wikt:pr ꜥꜣ, pr ꜥꜣ''; Meroitic language, Meroitic: 𐦲𐦤𐦧, ; Biblical Hebrew: ''Parʿō'') was the title of the monarch of ancient Egypt from the First Dynasty of Egypt, First Dynasty ( ...
'' (1895).
Of contemporary thinkers, the one who most influenced Prus and other writers of the Polish "
Positivist" period (roughly 1864–1900) was
Herbert Spencer
Herbert Spencer (27 April 1820 – 8 December 1903) was an English polymath active as a philosopher, psychologist, biologist, sociologist, and anthropologist. Spencer originated the expression "survival of the fittest", which he coined in '' ...
, the English
sociologist who coined the phrase, "
survival of the fittest
"Survival of the fittest" is a phrase that originated from Darwinian evolutionary theory as a way of describing the mechanism of natural selection. The biological concept of fitness is defined as reproductive success. In Darwinian terms, th ...
." Prus called Spencer "the
Aristotle
Aristotle (; 384–322 BC) was an Ancient Greek philosophy, Ancient Greek philosopher and polymath. His writings cover a broad range of subjects spanning the natural sciences, philosophy, linguistics, economics, politics, psychology, a ...
of the 19th century" and wrote: "I grew up under the influence of Spencerian
evolution
Evolution is the change in the heritable Phenotypic trait, characteristics of biological populations over successive generations. It occurs when evolutionary processes such as natural selection and genetic drift act on genetic variation, re ...
ary
philosophy
Philosophy ('love of wisdom' in Ancient Greek) is a systematic study of general and fundamental questions concerning topics like existence, reason, knowledge, Value (ethics and social sciences), value, mind, and language. It is a rational an ...
and heeded its counsels, not those of
Idealist
Idealism in philosophy, also known as philosophical realism or metaphysical idealism, is the set of metaphysical perspectives asserting that, most fundamentally, reality is equivalent to mind, spirit, or consciousness; that reality is entir ...
or
Comtean philosophy
Philosophy ('love of wisdom' in Ancient Greek) is a systematic study of general and fundamental questions concerning topics like existence, reason, knowledge, Value (ethics and social sciences), value, mind, and language. It is a rational an ...
." Prus interpreted "survival of the fittest," in the societal sphere, as involving not only competition but also cooperation; and he adopted Spencer's metaphor of
society as organism. He used this metaphor to striking effect in his 1884
micro-story "
Mold of the Earth", and in the introduction to his 1895
historical novel
Historical fiction is a literary genre in which a fictional plot takes place in the setting of particular real historical events. Although the term is commonly used as a synonym for historical fiction literature, it can also be applied to oth ...
, ''
Pharaoh
Pharaoh (, ; Egyptian language, Egyptian: ''wikt:pr ꜥꜣ, pr ꜥꜣ''; Meroitic language, Meroitic: 𐦲𐦤𐦧, ; Biblical Hebrew: ''Parʿō'') was the title of the monarch of ancient Egypt from the First Dynasty of Egypt, First Dynasty ( ...
''.
After Prus began writing regular weekly newspaper columns, his finances stabilized, permitting him on 14 January 1875 to marry a
distant cousin on his mother's side, Oktawia Trembińska. She was the daughter of Katarzyna Trembińska, in whose home he had lived, after release from prison, for two years from 1864 to 1866 while completing secondary school.
The couple adopted a boy, Emil Trembiński (born 11 September 1886, the son of Prus's brother-in-law Michał Trembiński, who had died on 10 November 1888).
Emil was the model for Rascal in chapter 48 of Prus's 1895 novel, ''
Pharaoh
Pharaoh (, ; Egyptian language, Egyptian: ''wikt:pr ꜥꜣ, pr ꜥꜣ''; Meroitic language, Meroitic: 𐦲𐦤𐦧, ; Biblical Hebrew: ''Parʿō'') was the title of the monarch of ancient Egypt from the First Dynasty of Egypt, First Dynasty ( ...
''.
On 18 February 1904, aged seventeen, Emil fatally shot himself in the chest on the doorstep of an unrequited love.
It has been alleged that in 1906, aged 59, Prus had a son, Jan Bogusz Sacewicz. The boy's mother was Alina Sacewicz, widow of Dr. Kazimierz Sacewicz, a socially conscious physician whom Prus had known at Nałęczów. Dr. Sacewicz may have been the model for
Stefan Żeromski's Dr. Judym in the novel, ''Ludzie bezdomni'' (Homeless People)—a character resembling Dr. Stockman in
Henrik Ibsen
Henrik Johan Ibsen (; ; 20 March 1828 – 23 May 1906) was a Norwegian playwright, poet and actor. Ibsen is considered the world's pre-eminent dramatist of the 19th century and is often referred to as "the father of modern drama." He pioneered ...
's play, ''
An Enemy of the People
''An Enemy of the People'' (original Norwegian title: ''En folkefiende'') is an 1882 play by Norwegian playwright Henrik Ibsen that explores the conflict between personal integrity and societal norms. The play centers on Dr. Thomas Stockmann, w ...
''.
Prus, known for his affection for children, took a lively interest in little Jan, as attested by a prolific correspondence with Jan's mother (whom Prus attempted to interest in writing). Jan Sacewicz became one of Prus's major
legatee
A legatee, in the law of wills, is any individual or organization bequeathed any portion of a testator's estate.
Usage
Depending upon local custom, legatees may be called "devisees". Traditionally, "legatees" took personal property under will a ...
s and an engineer, and died in a German camp after the suppression of the
Warsaw Uprising
The Warsaw Uprising (; ), sometimes referred to as the August Uprising (), or the Battle of Warsaw, was a major World War II operation by the Polish resistance movement in World War II, Polish underground resistance to liberate Warsaw from ...
of August–October 1944.

Though Prus was a gifted writer, initially best known as a humorist, he early on thought little of his journalistic and literary work. Hence at the inception of his career in 1872, at the age of 25, he adopted for his newspaper columns and fiction the
pen name
A pen name or nom-de-plume is a pseudonym (or, in some cases, a variant form of a real name) adopted by an author and printed on the title page or by-line of their works in place of their real name.
A pen name may be used to make the author's na ...
"Prus" ("''
Prus I''" was his family
coat-of-arms
A coat of arms is a heraldic visual design on an escutcheon (i.e., shield), surcoat, or tabard (the last two being outer garments), originating in Europe. The coat of arms on an escutcheon forms the central element of the full heraldic achiev ...
), reserving his actual name, Aleksander Głowacki, for "serious" writing.
An 1878 incident illustrates the strong feelings that can be aroused in susceptible readers of newspaper columns. Prus had criticized the rowdy behavior of some Warsaw university students at a lecture about the poet
Wincenty Pol
Wincenty Pol (; 20 April 1807 – 2 December 1872) was a Polish poet and geographer.
Life
Pol was born in Lublin (then in Galicia), to Franz Pohl (or Poll), a German in the Austrian service, and his wife Eleonora Longchamps de Berier, from a ...
. The students demanded that Prus retract what he had written. He refused, and, on 26 March 1878, several of them surrounded him outside his home, where he had returned shortly before in the company (for his safety) of two fellow writers; one of the students, Jan Sawicki, slapped Prus's face.
Police were summoned, but Prus declined to press charges.
Seventeen years later, during his 1895 visit to
Paris
Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, largest city of France. With an estimated population of 2,048,472 residents in January 2025 in an area of more than , Paris is the List of ci ...
, Prus's memory of the incident was still so painful that he may have refused (accounts vary) to meet with one of his assailants,
Kazimierz Dłuski, and his wife
Bronisława Dłuska (
Marie Skłodowska Curie's sister who 19 years later, in 1914, scolded
Joseph Conrad
Joseph Conrad (born Józef Teodor Konrad Korzeniowski, ; 3 December 1857 – 3 August 1924) was a Poles in the United Kingdom#19th century, Polish-British novelist and story writer. He is regarded as one of the greatest writers in the Eng ...
for writing his novels and stories in English, rather than in
Polish for the benefit of Polish culture).
These curiously interlinked incidents involving the Dłuskis and the two authors perhaps illustrate the contemporary intensity of aggrieved Polish national pride.
In 1882, on the recommendation of an earlier editor-in-chief, the prophet of
Polish Positivism,
Aleksander Świętochowski
Aleksander Świętochowski (18 January 1849 – 25 April 1938) was a Polish writer, educator, and philosopher of the Positivism in Poland, Positivist period that followed the January Uprising, January 1863 Uprising.
He was widely regarded as the ...
, Prus succeeded to the editorship of the
Warsaw
Warsaw, officially the Capital City of Warsaw, is the capital and List of cities and towns in Poland, largest city of Poland. The metropolis stands on the Vistula, River Vistula in east-central Poland. Its population is officially estimated at ...
daily ''Nowiny'' (News). The newspaper had been bought in June 1882 by financier
Stanisław Kronenberg. Prus resolved, in the best
Positivist fashion, to make it "an observatory of societal facts"—an instrument for advancing the development of his country. After less than a year, however, ''Nowiny''—which had had a history of financial instability since changing in July 1878 from a Sunday paper to a daily—folded, and Prus resumed writing
columns
A column or pillar in architecture and structural engineering is a structural element that transmits, through compression, the weight of the structure above to other structural elements below. In other words, a column is a compression member ...
.
[Pieścikowski, Edward, ''Bolesław Prus'', 152.] He continued working as a journalist to the end of his life, well after he had achieved success as an author of short stories and novels.
In an 1884 newspaper column, published two decades before the Wright brothers flew, Prus anticipated that powered flight would not bring humanity closer to universal comity: "Are there among flying creatures only doves, and no hawks? Will tomorrow's flying machine obey only the honest and the wise, and not fools and knaves?... The expected societal changes may come down to a new form of chase and combat in which the man who is vanquished on high will fall and smash the skull of the peaceable man down below."
In a January 1909 column, Prus discussed
H. G. Wells
Herbert George Wells (21 September 1866 – 13 August 1946) was an English writer, prolific in many genres. He wrote more than fifty novels and dozens of short stories. His non-fiction output included works of social commentary, politics, hist ...
's 1901 book, ''
Anticipations'', including Wells's prediction that by the year 2000, following the defeat of German
imperialism
Imperialism is the maintaining and extending of Power (international relations), power over foreign nations, particularly through expansionism, employing both hard power (military and economic power) and soft power (diplomatic power and cultura ...
"on land and at sea," there would be a
European Union
The European Union (EU) is a supranational union, supranational political union, political and economic union of Member state of the European Union, member states that are Geography of the European Union, located primarily in Europe. The u ...
that would reach eastward to include the
western Slavs
The West Slavs are Slavic peoples who speak the West Slavic languages. They separated from the common Slavic group around the 7th century, and established independent polities in Central Europe by the 8th to 9th centuries. The West Slavic langu ...
—the
Poles
Pole or poles may refer to:
People
*Poles (people), another term for Polish people, from the country of Poland
* Pole (surname), including a list of people with the name
* Pole (musician) (Stefan Betke, born 1967), German electronic music artist
...
,
Czechs
The Czechs (, ; singular Czech, masculine: ''Čech'' , singular feminine: ''Češka'' ), or the Czech people (), are a West Slavs, West Slavic ethnic group and a nation native to the Czech Republic in Central Europe, who share a common Bohemia ...
and
Slovaks
The Slovaks ( (historical Sloveni ), singular: ''Slovák'' (historical: ''Sloven'' ), feminine: ''Slovenka'' , plural: ''Slovenky'') are a West Slavic ethnic group and nation native to Slovakia who share a common ancestry, culture, history ...
. The latter peoples, along with the
Hungarians
Hungarians, also known as Magyars, are an Ethnicity, ethnic group native to Hungary (), who share a common Culture of Hungary, culture, Hungarian language, language and History of Hungary, history. They also have a notable presence in former pa ...
and six other countries, did in fact join the
European Union
The European Union (EU) is a supranational union, supranational political union, political and economic union of Member state of the European Union, member states that are Geography of the European Union, located primarily in Europe. The u ...
in 2004.
Fiction

In time, Prus adopted the French Positivist critic
Hippolyte Taine
Hippolyte Adolphe Taine (21 April 1828 – 5 March 1893) was a French historian, critic and philosopher. He was the chief theoretical influence on French naturalism, a major proponent of sociological positivism and one of the first practitione ...
's concept of the arts, including literature, as a second means, alongside the sciences, of studying reality,
and he devoted more attention to his sideline of
short-story writer. Prus's stories, which met with great acclaim, owed much to the literary influence of Polish novelist
Józef Ignacy Kraszewski and, among English-language writers, to
Charles Dickens
Charles John Huffam Dickens (; 7 February 1812 – 9 June 1870) was an English novelist, journalist, short story writer and Social criticism, social critic. He created some of literature's best-known fictional characters, and is regarded by ...
and
Mark Twain
Samuel Langhorne Clemens (November 30, 1835 – April 21, 1910), known by the pen name Mark Twain, was an American writer, humorist, and essayist. He was praised as the "greatest humorist the United States has produced," with William Fau ...
.
His fiction was also influenced by French writers
Victor Hugo
Victor-Marie Hugo, vicomte Hugo (; 26 February 1802 – 22 May 1885) was a French Romanticism, Romantic author, poet, essayist, playwright, journalist, human rights activist and politician.
His most famous works are the novels ''The Hunchbac ...
,
Gustave Flaubert
Gustave Flaubert ( , ; ; 12 December 1821 – 8 May 1880) was a French novelist. He has been considered the leading exponent of literary realism in his country and abroad. According to the literary theorist Kornelije Kvas, "in Flaubert, realis ...
,
Alphonse Daudet
Alphonse Daudet (; 13 May 184016 December 1897) was a French novelist. He was the husband of Julia Daudet and father of Edmée, Léon and Lucien Daudet.
Early life
Daudet was born in Nîmes, France. His family, on both sides, belonged to the ' ...
and Émile Zola.
Prus wrote several dozen stories, originally published in newspapers and ranging in length from
micro-story to novella. Characteristic of them are Prus's keen observation of everyday life and sense of humor, which he had early honed as a contributor to humor magazines.
The prevalence of themes from everyday life is consistent with the Polish Positivist artistic program, which sought to portray the circumstances of the populace rather than those of the Romantic heroes of an earlier generation. The literary period in which Prus wrote was ostensibly a prose, prosaic one, by contrast with the poetry of the Romantics; but Prus's prose is often a prose poetry, poetic prose. His stories also often contain elements of fantasy or whimsy. A fair number originally appeared in New Year's issues of newspapers.
Prus long eschewed writing historical fiction, arguing that it must inevitably distort history. He criticized contemporary
historical novel
Historical fiction is a literary genre in which a fictional plot takes place in the setting of particular real historical events. Although the term is commonly used as a synonym for historical fiction literature, it can also be applied to oth ...
ists for their lapses in historical accuracy, including Henryk Sienkiewicz's failure, in the military scenes in his ''The Trilogy, Trilogy'' portraying 17th-century Polish history, to describe the logistics of warfare. It was only in 1888, when Prus was forty, that he wrote his first historical fiction, the stunning short story, "A Legend of Old Egypt." This story, a few years later, served as a preliminary sketch for his only historical novel, ''
Pharaoh
Pharaoh (, ; Egyptian language, Egyptian: ''wikt:pr ꜥꜣ, pr ꜥꜣ''; Meroitic language, Meroitic: 𐦲𐦤𐦧, ; Biblical Hebrew: ''Parʿō'') was the title of the monarch of ancient Egypt from the First Dynasty of Egypt, First Dynasty ( ...
'' (1895).
Eventually Prus composed four novels on what he had referred to in an 1884 letter as "great questions of our age":
''
The Outpost'' (''Placówka'', 1886) on the Polish peasant; ''
The Doll'' (''Lalka'', 1889) on the aristocracy and townspeople and on Ideal (ethics), idealists struggling to bring about social reforms; ''The New Woman (novel), The New Woman'' (''Emancypantki'', 1893) on feminism, feminist concerns; and his only
historical novel
Historical fiction is a literary genre in which a fictional plot takes place in the setting of particular real historical events. Although the term is commonly used as a synonym for historical fiction literature, it can also be applied to oth ...
, ''
Pharaoh
Pharaoh (, ; Egyptian language, Egyptian: ''wikt:pr ꜥꜣ, pr ꜥꜣ''; Meroitic language, Meroitic: 𐦲𐦤𐦧, ; Biblical Hebrew: ''Parʿō'') was the title of the monarch of ancient Egypt from the First Dynasty of Egypt, First Dynasty ( ...
'' (''Faraon'', 1895), on mechanisms of political power. The work of greatest sweep and most universal appeal is ''Pharaoh''.
Prus's novels, like his stories, were originally published in newspaper serial (literature), serialization.
After having sold ''Pharaoh'' to the publishing firm of Gebethner and Wolff, Prus embarked, on 16 May 1895, on a four-month journey abroad. He visited Berlin, Dresden, Karlovy Vary, Karlsbad, Nuremberg, Stuttgart and Rapperswil. At the latter Swiss town he stayed two months (July–August), nursing his
agoraphobia
Agoraphobia is an anxiety disorder characterized by symptoms of anxiety in situations where the person perceives their environment to be unsafe with no way to escape. These situations can include public transit, shopping centers, crowds and q ...
and spending much time with his friends, the promising young writer
Stefan Żeromski and his wife Oktawia. The couple sought Prus's help for the Polish Museum, Rapperswil#Żeromski and Prus, Polish National Museum, housed in the Rapperswil Castle, where Żeromski was librarian.
The final stage of Prus's journey took him to
Paris
Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, largest city of France. With an estimated population of 2,048,472 residents in January 2025 in an area of more than , Paris is the List of ci ...
, where he was prevented by his agoraphobia from crossing the Seine River to visit the city's southern Rive Gauche, Left Bank.
He was nevertheless pleased to find that his descriptions of Paris in ''The Doll'' had been on the mark (he had based them mainly on French-language publications).
From Paris, he hurried home to recuperate at
Nałęczów
Nałęczów is a spa town (population 4,800) situated on the Nałęczów Plateau in Puławy County, Lublin Voivodeship, eastern Poland. Nałęczów belongs to Lesser Poland.
History
In the 18th century, the discovery there of healing waters ini ...
from his journey, the last that he made abroad.
Later years
Over the years, Prus lent his support to many charitable and social causes, but there was one event he came to rue for the broad criticism it brought him: his participation in welcoming Russia's tsar during Nicholas II's 1897 visit to Warsaw.
As a rule, Prus did not affiliate himself with political parties, as this might compromise his journalistic objectivity. His associations, by design and temperament, were with individuals and select worthy causes rather than with large groups.
The disastrous
January 1863 Uprising had persuaded Prus that society must advance through learning, work and commerce rather than through risky social upheavals. He departed from this stance, however, in 1905, when
Imperial Russia
Imperial is that which relates to an empire, emperor/empress, or imperialism.
Imperial or The Imperial may also refer to:
Places
United States
* Imperial, California
* Imperial, Missouri
* Imperial, Nebraska
* Imperial, Pennsylvania
* ...
experienced defeat in the Russo-Japanese War and Poles demanded autonomy and reforms. On 20 December 1905, in the first issue of a short-lived periodical, ''Młodość'' (Youth), he published an article, "''Oda do młodości''" ("Ode to Youth"), whose title harked back to an 1820 poem by Adam Mickiewicz. Prus wrote, in reference to his earlier position on revolution and strikes: "with the greatest pleasure, I admit it—I was wrong!"
In 1908, Prus serialized, in the Warsaw ''Tygodnik Ilustrowany'' (Illustrated Weekly), his novel ''Dzieci'' (Children), depicting the young revolutionaries, terrorists and anarchists of the day – an uncharacteristically humorless work. Three years later a final novel, ''Przemiany'' (Changes), was to have been, like ''
The Doll'', a panorama of society and its vital concerns. However, in 1911 and 1912, the novel had barely begun serialization in the ''Illustrated Weekly'' when its composition was cut short by Prus's death.
Neither of the two late novels, ''Children'' or ''Changes'', is generally regarded as part of the essential Prus canon, and Czesław Miłosz has called ''Children'' one of Prus's weakest works.
Prus's last novel to meet with popular acclaim was ''
Pharaoh
Pharaoh (, ; Egyptian language, Egyptian: ''wikt:pr ꜥꜣ, pr ꜥꜣ''; Meroitic language, Meroitic: 𐦲𐦤𐦧, ; Biblical Hebrew: ''Parʿō'') was the title of the monarch of ancient Egypt from the First Dynasty of Egypt, First Dynasty ( ...
'', completed in 1895. Depicting the demise of
ancient Egypt
Ancient Egypt () was a cradle of civilization concentrated along the lower reaches of the Nile River in Northeast Africa. It emerged from prehistoric Egypt around 3150BC (according to conventional Egyptian chronology), when Upper and Lower E ...
's Twentieth Dynasty and
New Kingdom
New or NEW may refer to:
Music
* New, singer of K-pop group The Boyz
* ''New'' (album), by Paul McCartney, 2013
** "New" (Paul McCartney song), 2013
* ''New'' (EP), by Regurgitator, 1995
* "New" (Daya song), 2017
* "New" (No Doubt song), 1 ...
three thousand years earlier, ''Pharaoh'' had also reflected Poland's loss of independence a century before in 1795
—an independence whose post-World War I restoration Prus did not live to see.
On 19 May 1912, in his Warsaw apartment at 12 Wolf Street (''ulica Wilcza 12''), near Triple Cross Square, his forty-year journalistic and literary career came to an end when the 64-year-old author died.
The beloved agoraphobia, agoraphobic writer was mourned by the nation that he had striven, as soldier, thinker, and writer, to rescue from oblivion.
Thousands attended his 22 May 1912 funeral service at St. Alexander's Church, Warsaw, St. Alexander's Church on nearby Triple Cross Square (''Plac Trzech Krzyży'') and his interment at Powązki Cemetery.
Prus's tomb was designed by his nephew, the noted sculptor Stanisław Jackowski. On three sides it bears, respectively, the novelist's name, ''Aleksander Głowacki'', his years of birth and death, and his
pen name
A pen name or nom-de-plume is a pseudonym (or, in some cases, a variant form of a real name) adopted by an author and printed on the title page or by-line of their works in place of their real name.
A pen name may be used to make the author's na ...
, ''Bolesław Prus''. The epitaph on the fourth side, “''Serce Serc''” ("Heart of Hearts"), was deliberately borrowed from the Latin “''Cor Cordium''” on the grave of the English Romantic poet Percy Bysshe Shelley in Rome's Protestant Cemetery, Rome, Protestant Cemetery.
Below the epitaph stands the figure of a little girl embracing the tomb – a figure emblematic of Prus's well-known empathy and affection for children.
Prus's widow, Oktawia Głowacka, survived him by twenty-four years, dying on 25 October 1936.
In 1902 the editor of the Warsaw ''Kurier Codzienny'' (Daily Courier) had opined that, if Prus's writings had been well known abroad, he should have received one of the recently created Nobel Prizes.
Legacy
On 3 December 1961, nearly half a century after Prus's death, a museum devoted to him was opened in the 18th-century Małachowski Palace at
Nałęczów
Nałęczów is a spa town (population 4,800) situated on the Nałęczów Plateau in Puławy County, Lublin Voivodeship, eastern Poland. Nałęczów belongs to Lesser Poland.
History
In the 18th century, the discovery there of healing waters ini ...
, near
Lublin
Lublin is List of cities and towns in Poland, the ninth-largest city in Poland and the second-largest city of historical Lesser Poland. It is the capital and the centre of Lublin Voivodeship with a population of 336,339 (December 2021). Lublin i ...
in eastern Poland. Outside the palace is a sculpture of Prus seated on a bench. Another statuary monument to Prus at Nałęczów, sculpted by Alina Ślesińska, was unveiled on 8 May 1966.
It was at Nałęczów that Prus vacationed for thirty years from 1882 until his death, and that he met the young
Stefan Żeromski. Prus stood witness at Żeromski's 1892 wedding and generously helped foster the younger man's literary career.
While Prus espoused a positivist and Literary realism, realist outlook, much in his fiction shows qualities compatible with pre-January Uprising, 1863-Uprising Polish Romantic literature. Indeed, he held the Polish Romanticism, Romantic poet Adam Mickiewicz in high regard.
Prus's novels in turn, especially ''
The Doll'' and ''
Pharaoh
Pharaoh (, ; Egyptian language, Egyptian: ''wikt:pr ꜥꜣ, pr ꜥꜣ''; Meroitic language, Meroitic: 𐦲𐦤𐦧, ; Biblical Hebrew: ''Parʿō'') was the title of the monarch of ancient Egypt from the First Dynasty of Egypt, First Dynasty ( ...
'', with their innovative composition techniques, blazed the way for the 20th-century Polish novel.
Prus's novel ''
The Doll'', with its rich realistic detail and simple, functional language, was considered by Czesław Miłosz to be the great Polish novel.
Joseph Conrad
Joseph Conrad (born Józef Teodor Konrad Korzeniowski, ; 3 December 1857 – 3 August 1924) was a Poles in the United Kingdom#19th century, Polish-British novelist and story writer. He is regarded as one of the greatest writers in the Eng ...
, during his 1914 visit to Poland just as World War I was breaking out, "delighted in his beloved Prus" and read everything by the ten-years-older, recently deceased author that he could get his hands on.
He pronounced ''The New Woman (novel), The New Woman'' (the first novel by Prus that he read) "better than Charles Dickens, Dickens"—Dickens being a favorite author of Conrad's.
Czesław Miłosz, Miłosz, however, thought ''The New Woman (novel), The New Woman'' "as a whole... an artistic failure..."
Zygmunt Szweykowski (historian), Zygmunt Szweykowski similarly faulted ''The New Womans loose, tangential construction; but this, in his view, was partly redeemed by Prus's humor and by some superb episodes, while "The tragedy of Mrs. Latter and the picture of [the town of] Iksinów are among the peak achievements of [Polish] novel-writing."
''
Pharaoh
Pharaoh (, ; Egyptian language, Egyptian: ''wikt:pr ꜥꜣ, pr ꜥꜣ''; Meroitic language, Meroitic: 𐦲𐦤𐦧, ; Biblical Hebrew: ''Parʿō'') was the title of the monarch of ancient Egypt from the First Dynasty of Egypt, First Dynasty ( ...
'', a study of political power, became the favorite novel of Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin, prefigured the fate of U.S. President John F. Kennedy, and continues to point analogies to more recent times.
''Pharaoh'' is often described as Prus's "best-composed novel"
—indeed, "one of the best-composed [of all] Polish novels."
This was due in part to ''Pharaoh'' having been composed complete prior to newspaper serialization, rather than being written in installments just before printing, as was the case with Prus's earlier major novels.
''The Doll'' and ''Pharaoh'' are available in English versions.
''The Doll'' has been translated into twenty-eight languages, and ''Pharaoh'' into twenty-three. In addition, ''The Doll'' has been filmed several times (including a The Doll (1968 film), 1968 film directed by Wojciech Jerzy Has) and been produced as a 1977 television miniseries ('':pl:Lalka (serial telewizyjny), Lalka'', directed by :pl:Ryszard Ber, Ryszard Ber). ''Pharaoh'' was adapted into a Pharaoh (film), 1966 feature film.
Between 1897 and 1899 Prus Serial (literature), serialized in the Warsaw ''Daily Courier'' (''Kurier Codzienny'') a monograph on ''Wikisource:The Most General Life Ideals, The Most General Life Ideals'' (''Najogólniejsze ideały życiowe''), which systematized ethical ideas that he had developed over his career regarding ''happiness'', ''utility'' and ''perfection'' in the lives of individuals and societies. In it he returned to the society-organizing (i.e., political) interests that had been frustrated during his ''Nowiny'' editorship fifteen years earlier. A book edition appeared in 1901 (2nd, revised edition, 1905). This work, rooted in Jeremy Bentham's Utilitarianism, Utilitarian philosophy and Herbert Spencer#General influence, Herbert Spencer's view of society-as-organism, retains interest especially for philosophy, philosophers and social science, social scientists.
Another of Prus's learned projects remained incomplete at his death. He had sought, over his writing career, to develop a coherent theory of literary composition. Notes of his from 1886 to 1912 were never put together into a finished book as he had intended.
His precepts included the maxim, "Nouns, nouns and more nouns." Some particularly intriguing fragments describe Prus's combinatorial calculations of the millions of potential "individual types" of human character structure, characters, given a stated number of "individual Trait theory, traits."
A curious comparative literature, comparative-literature aspect has been noted to Prus's career, which paralleled that of his American contemporary, Ambrose Bierce (1842–1914). Each was born and reared in a rural area and had a "Polish" connection (Bierce, born five years before Prus, was reared in Kosciusko County, Indiana, and attended high school at the county seat, Warsaw, Indiana). Each became a war Casualty (person), casualty with combat head trauma—Prus in 1863 in the Polish January Uprising, 1863–65 Uprising; Bierce in 1864 in the American Civil War. Each experienced false starts in other occupations, and at twenty-five became a journalist for the next forty years; failed to sustain a career as editor-in-chief; achieved celebrity as a short-story writer; lost a son in tragic circumstances (Prus, an adopted son; Bierce, both his sons); attained superb humorous effects by portraying human egoism (Prus especially in ''
Pharaoh
Pharaoh (, ; Egyptian language, Egyptian: ''wikt:pr ꜥꜣ, pr ꜥꜣ''; Meroitic language, Meroitic: 𐦲𐦤𐦧, ; Biblical Hebrew: ''Parʿō'') was the title of the monarch of ancient Egypt from the First Dynasty of Egypt, First Dynasty ( ...
'', Bierce in ''The Devil's Dictionary''); was dogged from early adulthood by a health problem (Prus,
agoraphobia
Agoraphobia is an anxiety disorder characterized by symptoms of anxiety in situations where the person perceives their environment to be unsafe with no way to escape. These situations can include public transit, shopping centers, crowds and q ...
; Bierce, asthma); and died within two years of the other (Prus in 1912; Bierce presumably in 1914). Prus, however, unlike Bierce, went on from short stories to write novels.
In Prus' lifetime and since, his contributions to Polish literature and culture have been memorialized without regard to the nature of the political system prevailing at the time. His 50th birthday, in 1897, was marked by special newspaper issues celebrating his 25 years as a journalist and fiction writer, and a portrait of him was commissioned from artist Antoni Kamieński.
The town where Prus was born,
Hrubieszów
Hrubieszów (; ; , or ) is a town in southeastern Poland, with a population of around 18,212 (2016). It is the capital of Hrubieszów County within the Lublin Voivodeship.
Throughout history, the town's culture and architecture was strongly shaped ...
, near the present Polish–Ukraine, Ukrainian border, is graced by an outdoor sculpture of him.
A 1982 plaque on Warsaw University's administration building, the historic Kazimierz Palace#Warsaw University, Kazimierz Palace, commemorates Prus' years at the university in 1866–68. Across the street (''Krakowskie Przedmieście'') from the university, in Holy Cross Church, Warsaw, Holy Cross Church, adjacent to the pillar that holds Heart of Frédéric Chopin, Chopin's heart, a 1936 plaque by Prus' nephew Stanisław Jackowski, featuring Prus' profile, is dedicated to the memory of the "great writer and teacher of the nation."
On the front of Warsaw's present-day ''ulica Wilcza 12'' (12 Wolf Street), the site of Prus' last home, is a plaque commemorating the earlier, now-nonexistent building's most famous resident. A few hundred meters from there, ''ulica Bolesława Prusa'' (Bolesław Prus Street) debouches into the southeast corner of Warsaw's Triple Cross Square. In this square stands St. Alexander's Church, where Prus' funeral was held.
In 1937, plaques were installed at Warsaw's ''Krakowskie Przedmieście'' ''4'' and ''7'', where the two chief characters of Prus' novel ''
The Doll'', Stanisław Wokulski and Ignacy Rzecki, respectively, were deduced to have resided.
On the same street, in a park adjacent to the Hotel Bristol, Warsaw, Hotel Bristol, near the site of a newspaper for which Prus wrote, stands the Bolesław Prus Monument, a twice-life-size statue of Prus, sculpted in 1977 by Anna Kamieńska-Łapińska;
it is some 12 feet tall, on a minimal pedestal as befits an author who walked the same ground with his fellow men.
Consonant with Prus' interest in commerce and technology, a Polish Ocean Lines cargo ship, freighter has been named for him.
For 10 years, from 1975 to 1984, Poles honored Prus' memory with a 10-Polish zloty, zloty coin featuring his profile. In 2012, to mark the 100th anniversary of his death, the Polish mint produced three coins with individual designs: in gold, silver, and an aluminum-zinc alloy.
Prus' fiction and nonfiction writings continue relevant in our time.
[Witness articles such as Aleksander Kaczorowski, ''"My z Wokulskiego"'' ("We [Descendants] of Wokulski) [protagonist of Prus's novel '' The Doll'']" in ''Plus Minus'', the ''Rzeczpospolita (newspaper), Rzeczpospolita'' (Republic) Weekly [Magazine], no. 33 (1016), Saturday-Sunday, 18–19 August 2012, pp. P8-P9.]
Works
Following is a chronological list of notable works by Bolesław Prus. Translated titles are given, followed by original titles and dates of publication.
Novels
* ''Souls in Bondage'' (''Dusze w niewoli'', written 1876, serial (literature), serialized 1877)
* ''Fame'' (''Sława'', begun 1885, never finished)
* ''
The Outpost'' (''Placówka'', 1885–86)
* ''
The Doll'' (''Lalka'', 1887–89)
* ''The New Woman (novel), The New Woman'' (''Emancypantki'', 1890–93)
* ''
Pharaoh
Pharaoh (, ; Egyptian language, Egyptian: ''wikt:pr ꜥꜣ, pr ꜥꜣ''; Meroitic language, Meroitic: 𐦲𐦤𐦧, ; Biblical Hebrew: ''Parʿō'') was the title of the monarch of ancient Egypt from the First Dynasty of Egypt, First Dynasty ( ...
'' (''Faraon'', written 1894–95; serial (literature), serialized 1895–96; published in book form 1897)
* ''Children'' (''Dzieci'', 1908; approximately the first nine chapters had originally appeared, in a somewhat different form, in 1907 as ''Dawn'' [''Świt''])
* ''Changes'' (''Przemiany'', begun 1911–12; unfinished)
Stories
* "Granny's Troubles" (''"Kłopoty babuni,"'' 1874)
* "The Palace and the Hovel" (''"Pałac i rudera,"'' 1875)
* "The Ball Gown" (''"Sukienka balowa,"'' 1876)
* "An Orphan's Lot" (''"Sieroca dola,"'' 1876)
* "Eddy's Adventures" (''"Przygody Edzia,"'' 1876)
* "Damnable Happiness" (''"Przeklęte szczęście,"'' 1876)
* "The Honeymoon" (''"Miesiąc nektarowy"'', 1876)
* "In the Struggle with Life" (''"W walce z życiem"'', 1877)
* "Christmas Eve" (''"Na gwiazdkę"'', 1877)
* "Grandmother's Box" (''"Szkatułka babki,"'' 1878)
* "Little Stan's Adventure" (''"Przygoda Stasia,"'' 1879)
* "New Year" (''"Nowy rok,"'' 1880)
* "The Returning Wave" (''"Powracająca fala,"'' 1880)
* "Michałko" (1880)
* "Antek" (1880)
* "The Convert" (''"Nawrócony,"'' 1880)
* "Katarynka, The Barrel Organ" (''"Katarynka,"'' 1880)
* "One of Many" (''"Jeden z wielu,"'' 1882)
* "The Waistcoat" (''"Kamizelka,"'' 1882)
* "Him" (''"On,"'' 1882)
* "Fading Voices" (''"Milknące głosy,"'' 1883)
* "Sins of Childhood" (''"Grzechy dzieciństwa,"'' 1883)
* "
Mold of the Earth" (''"Pleśń świata,"'' 1884: a brilliant
micro-story portraying
human history
Human history or world history is the record of humankind from prehistory to the present. Early modern human, Modern humans evolved in Africa around 300,000 years ago and initially lived as hunter-gatherers. They Early expansions of hominin ...
as an endless series of conflicts among Mold (fungus), mold colonies inhabiting a common boulder)
* "wikisource:The Living Telegraph, The Living Telegraph" (''"Żywy telegraf,"'' 1884)
* "Orestes (mythology), Orestes and Pylades" (''"Orestes i Pylades,"'' 1884)
* "She Loves Me?... She Loves Me Not?..." (''"Kocha—nie kocha?..."'', a Flash fiction, micro-story, 1884)
* "The Mirror" (''"Zwierciadło,"'' 1884)
* "On Vacation" (''"Na wakacjach,"'' 1884)
* "An Old Tale" (''"Stara bajka,"'' 1884)
* "In the Light of the Moon" (''"Przy księżycu,"'' 1884)
* "A Mistake" (''"Omyłka,"'' 1884)
* "Mr. Dutkowski and His Farm" (''"Pan Dutkowski i jego folwark,"'' 1884)
* "Musical Echoes" (''"Echa muzyczne,"'' 1884)
* "In the Mountains" (''"W górach,"'' 1885)
* "Shades (story), Shades" (''"Ciene,"'' 1885: an evocative Flash fiction, micro-story on Existentialism, existential themes)
* "Anielka" (1885)
* "A Strange Story" (''"Dziwna historia,"'' 1887)
* "A Legend of Old Egypt" (''"Z legend dawnego Egiptu,"'' 1888: Prus's stunning first piece of historical fiction; a preliminary sketch for his only
historical novel
Historical fiction is a literary genre in which a fictional plot takes place in the setting of particular real historical events. Although the term is commonly used as a synonym for historical fiction literature, it can also be applied to oth ...
, ''
Pharaoh
Pharaoh (, ; Egyptian language, Egyptian: ''wikt:pr ꜥꜣ, pr ꜥꜣ''; Meroitic language, Meroitic: 𐦲𐦤𐦧, ; Biblical Hebrew: ''Parʿō'') was the title of the monarch of ancient Egypt from the First Dynasty of Egypt, First Dynasty ( ...
'', which he wrote in 1894–95)
* "The Dream" (''"Sen,"'' 1890)
* "Lives of Saints" (''"Z żywotów świętych,"'' 1891–92)
* "Reconciled" (''"Pojednani,"'' 1892)
* "A Composition by Little Frank: About Mercy" (''"Z wypracowań małego Frania. O miłosierdziu,"'' 1898)
* "The Doctor's Story" (''"Opowiadanie lekarza,"'' 1902)
* "Memoirs of a Cyclist" (''"Ze wspomnień cyklisty,"'' 1903)
* "Revenge" (''"Zemsta,"'' 1908)
* "Phantoms" (''"Widziadła,"'' 1911, first published 1936)
Nonfiction
* "Letters from the Old Camp" (''"Listy ze starego obozu"''), 1872: Prus's first composition signed with the pseudonym ''Bolesław Prus''.
* "On the Structure of the Universe" (''"O budowie wszechświata"''), public lecture, 23 February 1873.
* ":Wikisource:Translation:On Discoveries and Inventions, On Discoveries and Inventions" (''"O odkryciach i wynalazkach"''): A Public Lecture Delivered on 23 March 1873 by Aleksander Głowacki [Bolesław Prus], Passed by the [Russian] Censor (Warsaw, 21 April 1873), Warsaw, Printed by F. Krokoszyńska, 1873. Translated from the Polish by Christopher Kasparek
* "Travel Notes (Wieliczka)" [''"Kartki z podróży (Wieliczka),"'' 1878—Prus's impressions of the Wieliczka Salt Mine; these helped inform the conception of the Labyrinth#The Egyptian labyrinth, Egyptian Labyrinth in Prus's 1895 novel, ''Pharaoh (Prus novel)#Inspirations, Pharaoh'']
* "A Word to the Public" (''"Słówko do publiczności,"'' 11 June 1882 – Prus's inaugural address to readers as the new editor-in-chief of the daily, ''Nowiny'' [News], famously proposing to make it "an observatory of societal facts, just as there are observatories that study the movements of heavenly bodies, or—climatic changes.")
* "Sketch for a Program under the Conditions of the Present Development of Society" (''"Szkic programu w warunkach obecnego rozwoju społeczeństwa,"'' 23–30 March 1883—swan song of Prus's editorship of ''Nowiny'')
* "''With Sword and Fire''—Henryk Sienkiewicz's Novel of Olden Times" (''"''Ogniem i mieczem''—powieść z dawnych lat Henryka Sienkiewicza,"'' 1884—Prus's review of Henryk Sienkiewicz, Sienkiewicz's historical novel, and essay on historical novel
Historical fiction is a literary genre in which a fictional plot takes place in the setting of particular real historical events. Although the term is commonly used as a synonym for historical fiction literature, it can also be applied to oth ...
s)
* "The Paris Tower" (''"Wieża paryska,"'' 1887—whimsical divagations involving the Eiffel Tower
The Eiffel Tower ( ; ) is a wrought-iron lattice tower on the Champ de Mars in Paris, France. It is named after the engineer Gustave Eiffel, whose company designed and built the tower from 1887 to 1889.
Locally nicknamed "''La dame de fe ...
, the world's tallest structure, then yet to be constructed for the 1889 Paris
Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, largest city of France. With an estimated population of 2,048,472 residents in January 2025 in an area of more than , Paris is the List of ci ...
''Exposition Universelle (1889), Exposition Universelle'')
* "Travels on Earth and in Heaven" (''"Wędrówka po ziemi i niebie,"'' 1887—Prus's impressions of a solar eclipse
A solar eclipse occurs when the Moon passes between Earth and the Sun, thereby obscuring the view of the Sun from a small part of Earth, totally or partially. Such an alignment occurs approximately every six months, during the eclipse season i ...
that he observed at Mława
Mława (; ''Mlave'') is a town in north-eastern Poland with 30,403 inhabitants in 2020. It is the capital of Mława County. It is situated in the Masovian Voivodeship.
During the invasion of Poland in 1939, the battle of Mława was fought to the ...
; these helped inspire the solar-eclipse scenes in his 1895 novel, ''Pharaoh (Prus novel)#Inspirations, Pharaoh'')
* "A Word about Positive Criticism" (''"Słówko o krytyce pozytywnej,"'' 1890—Prus's part of a polemic with Positivist guru Aleksander Świętochowski
Aleksander Świętochowski (18 January 1849 – 25 April 1938) was a Polish writer, educator, and philosopher of the Positivism in Poland, Positivist period that followed the January Uprising, January 1863 Uprising.
He was widely regarded as the ...
)
* "Eusapia Palladino" (1893—a newspaper column about mediumship, mediumistic séances held in Warsaw by the Italian Spiritualism (movement), Spiritualist, Eusapia Palladino; these helped inspire similar scenes in Prus's 1895 novel, ''Pharaoh (Prus novel)#Inspirations, Pharaoh'')
* "From Nałęczów" (''"Z Nałęczowa,"'' 1894—Prus's paean to the salubrious waters and natural and social environment of his favorite vacation spot, Nałęczów
Nałęczów is a spa town (population 4,800) situated on the Nałęczów Plateau in Puławy County, Lublin Voivodeship, eastern Poland. Nałęczów belongs to Lesser Poland.
History
In the 18th century, the discovery there of healing waters ini ...
)
* ''Wikisource:The Most General Life Ideals, The Most General Life Ideals'' (''Najogólniejsze ideały życiowe'', 1905—Prus's system of pragmatic ethics)
* "Ode to Youth" (''"Oda do młodości,"'' 1905—Prus's admission that, before the Russian Empire's defeat in the Russo-Japanese War, he had held too cautious a view of the chances for an improvement in Poland's political situation)
* "Visions of the Future" (''"Wizje przyszłości,"'' 1909—a discussion of H. G. Wells
Herbert George Wells (21 September 1866 – 13 August 1946) was an English writer, prolific in many genres. He wrote more than fifty novels and dozens of short stories. His non-fiction output included works of social commentary, politics, hist ...
' 1901 futurology, futurological book, '' Anticipations'', which predicted, among other things, the defeat of German imperialism, the ascendancy of the English language, and the existence, by the year 2000, of a "European Union
The European Union (EU) is a supranational union, supranational political union, political and economic union of Member state of the European Union, member states that are Geography of the European Union, located primarily in Europe. The u ...
" that included the Slavic peoples of Central Europe)
* "The Poet, Educator of the Nation" (''"Poeta wychowawca narodu,"'' 1910—a discussion of the cultural and political principles imparted by the Polish poet Adam Mickiewicz)
* "What We... Never Learned from the History of Napoleon" (''"Czego nas... nie nauczyły dzieje Napoleona"''—Prus's contribution to 16 December 1911 issue of the Warsaw ''Illustrated Weekly'', devoted entirely to Napoleon)
Translations
Prus's writings have been translated into many languages – his
historical novel
Historical fiction is a literary genre in which a fictional plot takes place in the setting of particular real historical events. Although the term is commonly used as a synonym for historical fiction literature, it can also be applied to oth ...
''
Pharaoh
Pharaoh (, ; Egyptian language, Egyptian: ''wikt:pr ꜥꜣ, pr ꜥꜣ''; Meroitic language, Meroitic: 𐦲𐦤𐦧, ; Biblical Hebrew: ''Parʿō'') was the title of the monarch of ancient Egypt from the First Dynasty of Egypt, First Dynasty ( ...
'', into twenty-three; his contemporary novel ''
The Doll'', into twenty-eight.
Works by Prus have been rendered into Croatian language, Croatian by a member of the Croatian Academy of Sciences and Arts, Stjepan Musulin.
Film versions
* 1966: ''Faraon'' Pharaoh (film), (Pharaoh), adapted from the novel ''
Pharaoh
Pharaoh (, ; Egyptian language, Egyptian: ''wikt:pr ꜥꜣ, pr ꜥꜣ''; Meroitic language, Meroitic: 𐦲𐦤𐦧, ; Biblical Hebrew: ''Parʿō'') was the title of the monarch of ancient Egypt from the First Dynasty of Egypt, First Dynasty ( ...
'', directed by Jerzy Kawalerowicz]
* 1968: ''Lalka (The Doll (1968 film), The Doll''), adapted from the novel ''
The Doll'', directed by Wojciech Jerzy Has]
* 1977: '':pl:Lalka (serial telewizyjny), Lalka'' (TV serial, ''The Doll''), adapted from the novel ''
The Doll'', directed by :pl:Ryszard Ber, Ryszard Ber.
* 1979: '':pl:Placówka (film), Placówka'' (The Outpost), adapted from the novel ''
The Outpost'', directed by Zygmunt Skonieczny.
* 1982: '':pl:Pensja pani Latter, Pensja pani Latter'' (Mrs. Latter's Boarding School), adapted from the novel ''
The New Woman'', directed by :pl:Stanisław Różewicz, Stanisław Różewicz.
See also
* Bolesław Prus Monument
* Flash fiction#Authors, Flash fiction
* History of philosophy in Poland#Positivism, History of philosophy in Poland
* List of coupled cousins#Notable people, List of coupled cousins
* List of newspaper columnists
* List of Poles#Philosophy, List of Poles—Philosophy
* List of Poles#Prose literature, List of Poles—Prose literature
* Logology (science of science)#Discoveries and inventions, Logology (science of science)—Discoveries and inventions
* Positivism in Poland#Leading authors, Positivism in Poland
* Zakopane#Notable visitors, Zakopane
Notes
References
Citations
Bibliography
*
* :pl:Jan Zygmunt Jakubowski, Jan Zygmunt Jakubowski, ed., ''Literatura polska od średniowiecza do pozytywizmu'' (Polish Literature from the Middle Ages to Positivism), Warsaw, Państwowe Wydawnictwo Naukowe, 1979.
* Christopher Kasparek, "Prus' ''
Pharaoh
Pharaoh (, ; Egyptian language, Egyptian: ''wikt:pr ꜥꜣ, pr ꜥꜣ''; Meroitic language, Meroitic: 𐦲𐦤𐦧, ; Biblical Hebrew: ''Parʿō'') was the title of the monarch of ancient Egypt from the First Dynasty of Egypt, First Dynasty ( ...
'': the Creation of a Historical Novel", ''The Polish Review'', vol. XXXIX, no. 1, 1994, pp. 45–50.
* Christopher Kasparek, "Two Micro-stories by Bolesław Prus", ''The Polish Review'', vol. XL, no. 1, 1995, pp. 99–103.
* Christopher Kasparek, "Prus' ''
Pharaoh
Pharaoh (, ; Egyptian language, Egyptian: ''wikt:pr ꜥꜣ, pr ꜥꜣ''; Meroitic language, Meroitic: 𐦲𐦤𐦧, ; Biblical Hebrew: ''Parʿō'') was the title of the monarch of ancient Egypt from the First Dynasty of Egypt, First Dynasty ( ...
'': Primer on Power", ''The Polish Review'', vol. XL, no. 3, 1995, pp. 331–34.
* Christopher Kasparek, "Prus' ''
Pharaoh
Pharaoh (, ; Egyptian language, Egyptian: ''wikt:pr ꜥꜣ, pr ꜥꜣ''; Meroitic language, Meroitic: 𐦲𐦤𐦧, ; Biblical Hebrew: ''Parʿō'') was the title of the monarch of ancient Egypt from the First Dynasty of Egypt, First Dynasty ( ...
'' and the Wieliczka Salt Mine", ''The Polish Review'', vol. XLII, no. 3, 1997, pp. 349–55.
* Christopher Kasparek, "Prus' ''
Pharaoh
Pharaoh (, ; Egyptian language, Egyptian: ''wikt:pr ꜥꜣ, pr ꜥꜣ''; Meroitic language, Meroitic: 𐦲𐦤𐦧, ; Biblical Hebrew: ''Parʿō'') was the title of the monarch of ancient Egypt from the First Dynasty of Egypt, First Dynasty ( ...
'' and the Solar Eclipse", ''The Polish Review'', vol. XLII, no. 4, 1997, pp. 471–78.
* Christopher Kasparek, "A Futurological Note: Prus on
H. G. Wells
Herbert George Wells (21 September 1866 – 13 August 1946) was an English writer, prolific in many genres. He wrote more than fifty novels and dozens of short stories. His non-fiction output included works of social commentary, politics, hist ...
and the Year 2000," ''The Polish Review'', vol. XLVIII, no. 1, 2003, pp. 89–100.
*
* Czesław Miłosz, Miłosz, Czesław (1983), ''The History of Polish Literature'', second edition, Berkeley, University of California Press, .
* Zdzisław Najder, ''Joseph Conrad, Conrad under Familial Eyes'', Cambridge University Press, 1984, .
* Zdzisław Najder, ''
Joseph Conrad
Joseph Conrad (born Józef Teodor Konrad Korzeniowski, ; 3 December 1857 – 3 August 1924) was a Poles in the United Kingdom#19th century, Polish-British novelist and story writer. He is regarded as one of the greatest writers in the Eng ...
: A Life'', translated by Halina Najder, Rochester, Camden House, 2007, .
*
* :pl:Monika Piątkowska, Monika Piątkowska, ''Prus: Śledztwo biograficzne'' (Prus: A Biographical Investigation), Kraków, Wydawnictwo Znak, 2017, .
*
* Bolesław Prus, ''s:On Discoveries and Inventions, On Discoveries and Inventions: A Public Lecture Delivered on 23 March 1873 by Aleksander Głowacki [Bolesław Prus]'', Passed by the [Russian] Censor (Warsaw, 21 April 1873), Warsaw, Printed by F. Krokoszyńska, 1873.
* (This book contains twelve stories by Prus, including the volume's title story, in inaccurate, clunky translations.)
*
*
* Robert Reid, ''Marie Curie'', New York, New American Library, 1974.
*
*
*
* Tokarzówna, Krystyna (1981), ''Młodość Bolesława Prusa'' (Bolesław Prus' Youth), Warsaw, Państwowy Instytut Wydawniczy, .
*
*
External links
Works by Bolesław Prusat
Polish Wikisource
* Józef Bachórz
Bolesław Prusin the Virtual Library of Polish Literature
Bolesław Pruscollected works (Polish)
*
*
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