| dc.description.abstract | As a Polish writer of German-language works, Artur Becker sees his work and his biography in his self-narrative at
the interface of the German language he chose and the Polish culture and language he abandoned due to his
emigration to Germany. His novels address the crisis of identity and the search for identity of his characters in
exile or on their return to their homeland of Warmia and Masuria. Becker’s collection of essays, published in
Polish under the title Kosmopolska i Kosmopolacy. W poszukiwaniu europejskiego domu. Eseje (2019), is also a
discourse on the search for identity. The article is an attempt to characterise the Becker’s definition of the term
Kosmopolska, which incidentally comes from another émigré writer, A. Bobkowski. Kosmopolska turns out to be an open
space, constructed narratively, that is a space of searching for and creating one’s identity in narrative and
through language. This form of defining identity is part of P. Ricoeur’s and Ch. Taylor’s concepts of narrative
identity. At each stations of the journey through Kosmopolska, Becker explains the many cultural patterns and codes
rooted in Polish identity, but also shares his advice, literary experts, and thus becomes a mediator between
cultures. | en |
