Anna Pisula

University of Warsaw

Thomas Zan’s Diary from the Exile, or Romanticism in Isolation

Thomas Zan (in Polish: Tomasz Zan) was a nineteenth century author, recognized in Poland primarily as Adam Mickiewicz’s friend and a member of the undercover societies of Philomaths and Filarets based in Vilnius. He was exiled in the year 1824 under the suspicion of conspiracy against the Russian State (which held its domination above the territory of the former Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth at that time). His diary from the exile presents an interesting case of the Romanticism developed in cultural isolation – with little access to new literary discussions and with no possibility to publish his own work (which, as a result, deprived him of the literary public’s feedback about his ideas). It effected in a unique way of understanding Romanticism as a literary trend. Moreover, Zan’s exile served as an act of isolation also in a literal sense of depriving the author of the contact with his loved ones. The diary, therefore, is also an example of processing the unfulfilled need for communication. The presently mentioned manifestations of the exile-related experience demonstrate the link between the literary text and the socio-political condition of the author.