Kategorie sakrologiczne w badaniach literackich i teatralnych

Abstract

This sketch refers to the sacral research of literary and theatrical study line. Studies of greater importance in this scope dating mainly from the last quarter of the 20th century were discussed in the first part. Further parts of the text are of more general character - including multiple expressions of the sacred (sacrum) in culture, especially formulated under the influence of postmodernism and the new ageideology. The text comprises the suggestion of diagnosing and reordering of sacral categories and adjusting them to the needs of research on contemporary literary work. It opens the way to more developed conceptions whose analysis will be possible on the basis of the analysis of theatrical undertakings. The draft took advantage of the contrast between: sanctum and sacrum, making two-way presentation of the sacral object possible. Sanctum is equal to the highest good and its character bears the value of the person, these characteristics are nonexistent in reference to objects named with the help of the term ‘sacrum’. Amongst them there are ,,low” objects of adoration, most frequently secular ones but also postmodernist images of God, devoid of personal traits. The specification of both sacral categories emerges from spiritual dilemmas of the contemporary subject revealed in the reflection of M. Heidegger’s, G, Bataille’s, P. Tillich’s, G. Marcel’s, J. Tischner’s and others philosophers’ contemplations. Due to these philosophical and also cultural contexts both categories - the personal sanctum and non - personal sacrum - acquire theadequate interpretation, research credibility and methodological usefulness. At present the theatre absorbs the attention of the audience in many ways and demands the presentation of the phenomenon of sacral issues both on the part of creators and recipients of the work. Their attitude towards this set of contexts may differ markedly and become the subject of consciously conducted game. Thus the need to sketch out the break between sacrum and sanctum arises in the research together with the need of examining this opposition on the part of the presenters and separately on the part of the audience. The combination of both oppositions constitutes the overall beginning, comprising all sacral elements in the work. The motherland can be freely enriched on account of all variants of the sacral theme together with the diversity of its media, symbolic character, forms of the language of religion, attitudes towards iconofilia, iconoclasm, towards taboo, profanation or blasphemy. These important issues demand, however, a separate analysis.