Five Easy Pieces? What Eliza Orzeszkowa’s early works presuppose
The economization of the world and life in it, as well as the subsequent consequences of this, was also evident in Orzeszkowa’s Cnotliwi [The Virtuous], a minor piece published in 1871 in the newspaper Gazeta Polska eighteen months after it was written. As Krzyżanowski mentions in his editorial note, Orzeszkowa herself considered the novel to be weak and she thus excluded it from collected editions while also being unwilling to sanction translations.[23] Indeed, the work lacks a convincing plot and lacks evidence of plausible psychological portraits, while any distance to the events depicted is completely absent as they are approached with a rather dour seriousness. Still, even poor works of literature can sometimes offer more insight into a writer, their ideas and their era than outstanding works. This is case with Cnotliwi.
The novel’s motto comes from Moliѐre’s comedy Tartuffe (Polish: Świętoszek),[24] with Orzeszkowa thus drawing attention to the troubling social hypocrisy, which she herself perhaps experienced, as people with many sins on their conscience presented themselves as defenders of morality. Indeed, the people around the property owner Mrs Olympia Rostowiecka were not unburdened by morally dubious deeds yet they still commented on and observed the emerging feelings between Wanda Rodowska and August Przybycki with a degree of attention worthy of more important matters. Przybycki worked as an official, earning an income to pay for his home and support his sick wife, sacrificing his innate talent as a pianist and his love of music.
The most interesting and at the same time most enigmatic figure is Edward Gaczycki. A wealthy man, he belongs to the small-town elite while distancing himself from it somewhat. He observes the social life of the city, knows people’s secrets, speaks rarely and is ironic, opening up sincerely only to the noble and older Mrs Starowolska. Together, they discuss organizing support for the neglected children of the bigoted Apolonia Kuderska. As he says to his friend,
I will admit to you openly that taking away children from parents who should under ordinary circumstances take care of them, thus alleviating their carelessness and removing a burden from their shoulders and placing it on others’, goes against my ideas of social justice and the laws of social economy (C, chapter XVII).
