Mit arkadyjski a (nie)możliwość powrotu do stanu "utraconej niewinności"

Abstract

Arcadian myth occurs in the European culture in various forms. For example, it can express longing after life not affected by culture and civilisation (which is a tradition originating in Theocritus and Virgil), or on the contrary, critique of a simple uncomplicated existence in agreement with nature (Plautus, Pliny, Rabelais). There are many works of art expressing the Arcadian myth both in its positive and negative sense. The author thinks that some of them were and still are misinterpreted; they do not merely approve of nature and a possibility of return to it, but they also indicate impossibility of achieving the original condition of balance between the man and the nature, and reducing man to his primitive instincts, emotions, intuitions and drives.