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The Bad Child
A Maria Janion Reader
Maria Janion (Author), Marta Figlerowicz (Translated by)
9781517919689
Paperback / softback, published 9 September 2025
296 pages, 12 black and white illustrations
21.6 x 14 x 1.5 cm, 0.34 kg
"The remarkable creativity, energy, and erudition of Maria Janion, one of Poland's most important left-wing feminist critics, shine forth in these essays carefully curated and translated by Marta Figlerowicz." - Sianne Ngai, University of Chicago "Maria Janion's writing is foundational to so many currents of contemporary Central European thought - around nations and nationalism, gender and genre, everyday politics and the political writ large - that her invisibility in English has long struck those of us privileged to know her work as a tragedy, if not a crime. The Bad Child, however, suggests another possibility: that Janion has simply awaited an editor, translator, and scholar equal to the task of encompassing her. She has that, at last, in Marta Figlerowicz. This book belongs on the shelf of every humanist." - Benjamin Paloff, author of Worlds Apart: Genre and the Ethics of Representing Camps, Ghettos, and Besieged Cities
Collected writings from a visionary thinker about the perilous edge between patriotism and fascism How do nationalism and patriotism shape our understanding of identity, and when do they drift into dangerous territory? Marta Figlerowicz gathers a selection of writings from Maria Janion, one of Eastern Europe’s most profound and original intellectuals, to explore this fine line. Between her birth in Vilnius in 1926 and her death in Warsaw in 2020, Janion witnessed some of the most consequential events of the turbulent twentieth century: the rise of authoritarian nationalism in Poland, German occupation during World War II, Soviet control, and Poland’s uneasy integration into the West. As Western countries face their own nationalist resurgences, Janion’s writing holds tools to help move through this historical condition. The Bad Child offers sharp insights into how societies develop and assert their identities and histories-often at the cost of the people. Janion’s reflections on fascism, popular culture, and national self-fashioning presciently name and critique regional dynamics that have most recently resulted in the war between Russia and Ukraine, and they broadly expose the illusions that cultures can promote and the dangerous slide from national pride to exclusionary right-wing politics. A queer woman and survivor of World War II, a leftist who resisted Soviet orthodoxy, Janion lends a uniquely disruptive voice to contemporary discussions of fascism, and her insights resonate far beyond her Eastern European roots. Retail e-book files for this title are screen-reader friendly with images accompanied by short alt text and/or extended descriptions.
Contents Introduction Marta Figlerowicz Translator’s Note Marta Figlerowicz A Maria Janion Reader Part I. A Theory of Eastern Europe 1. Uncanny Slavdom 2. Poland’s Location in Europe 3. Between Death and Laughter: The Art of Jacek Malczewski Part II. Socialism, Patriotism, Nationhood 4. The Patriot-as-Madman 5. Socialism as a Prometheism Part III. Aesthetics, History, and Critical Method 6. The Project of Phantasmatic Critique 7. The History of Literature and the History of Ideas 8. Notes on Horror and Melodrama Part IV. The Authority of the Other 9. Adam Mickiewicz’s Jewish Legion 10. Fragments from a Lover’s Discourse 11. The Bad Child: Interviews Acknowledgments Publication History Index