Folk motifs in Bolesław Leśmians poetry

Bolesław Leśmian is a polish writer active especially at the beginning of the 20th century. His work is hard to be classified and it does not perfectly fit into any particular literature movement. The main theme of this essay is the confrontation of his poetry with folk motives and folkiness in general, due to the fact that it is one of the biggest source of his inspiration. Lésmian often refers to the original and pure human experiences, found in nature and out of his contemporary world. Inspiration from legends, ballads and fairy tales is apparent throughout his work, including his usage of symbols, motives and characters. His language is also apparently inspired by these sources. In my essay, I focus on the analysis of typical characters and symbols that are taken from the folk literature. Moreover, I also focus on author's specific poetics of death and metamorphosis. The final chapter present several specific examples of author's inspiration by folk literature