Między cogito a dubito. Uczniowskie drogi nie tylko do Różewicza

Abstract

The author of the article characterizes the situation of school interpretation of literary texts. She mentions the necessity of constant oscillation between motivation to read and care about the development of the pupils’ cognitive sphere in the reading class. The article reports the conclusions from the observation of works by upper secondary school pupils. The task, assigned in a 31-person class, was to point out the cultural issues pupils found important, basing on 13 poetic books by Tadeusz Różewicz. The pupils were to choose one volume, identify the corresponding contexts, and describe one of them in detail. In the conducted analyses, pupils focused on both old and modern literature, extended their perspective to include philosophy, introduced remarks concerning fine arts, and recognized the existential conditions of human life. They also paid attention to detail and conducted textual syntheses. The collected material allows posing a question about relations between the open-mindedness of the pupils’ research and the interpretive formalism of the school-leaving exam.