Gombrowicz’s Kitsch in the Context of (Post)Modernity Theory

The authoress of the article continues the searches initiated by Jerzy Jarzębski and discusses the phenomenon of kitsch in the work of Witold Gombrowicz. The study is based on a content analysis of selected fragments of works by this author (especially the novel titled Ferdydurke) and it refers to certain concepts of modernity and postmodernity (W. Welsch, R. Rorty, J. Baudrillard). The writer himself is treated as an original philosopher of modernity (and later postmodernity); on account of this, he was ahead of his time. The work presents the thesis that Gombrowicz may be attributed both the modernist sense of the category of kitsch and its parodical practices, as well as a peculiar tendency for kitsch and a tendency to play with kitsch. This tendency is analyzed in the article as an attitude corresponding to the postmodern condition, especially its characteristic phenomenon called the aesthetization of culture, which was mentioned, among other things, by Wolfgang Welsch (culture of design, gadgets and superficial styling). In this sense, Gombrowicz’s philosophy corresponds to the postmodern rehabilitation of kitsch.