Abstract: The paper focusses on the American and global influences in Reymont’s novel “The Promised Land” and discusses the similarieties between the polish novel and the American fiction from the same period.

Keywords: Poland, Lodz,  Wladyslaw Stanislaw Reymont, “The peasants” , “The Promised Land”

 

 

Wladyslaw Stanislaw Reymont was a Polish writer of the turn of the 20th century, famous especially for his novel Chlopi (The Peasants), for which he was awarded the Nobel Prize. He wrote The Promised Land, a novel set in Lódz at the end of the 19th century, between 1897 and 1898 when he lived in France. Half a century earlier Lódz was just a tiny village, but at the turn of the 20th century it boasted a population of about 300,000 people and was the fastest-growing industrial city in Poland (which then formally did not exist, as a century earlier it had been partitioned by Austria, Prussia and Russia). Reymont spent only a few months in Lódz after signing a contract with a publisher for a novel about the city. During this time, however, he went on a sightseeing tour to a factory and even worked temporarily in one in order to get some first-hand experience.

In this paper I try to show the American and global influences in Reymont’s novel The Promised Land. I argue that some typically American concepts such as the “melting pot”, “from rags to riches” and the “American dream” prove relevant in the analysis of The Promised Land. I also discuss striking similarities between Reymont’s novel and some American fiction from the same period; these analogies help me to highlight the global aspect of Reymont’s fiction. The paper also analyses how Reymont depicts the transformations brought about by capitalism and global economy, combined with new possibilities for social upward mobility, which result in the end of an old socio-economic order.

The very title of the novel, The Promised Land, clearly refers to the United States, the symbol of a better life for millions of immigrants from all over the world. Reymont seems to suggest that the city of Lódz is endowed with the features usually associated with America. Therefore, Lódz in the novel can be symbolically treated as a Polish microcosm corresponding to the American macrocosm.

The metaphor of the “melting pot,” typically used to describe American society, can be applied to the reality depicted in The Promised Land. The three main protagonists: Karol Borowiecki, a Pole, Maks Baum, a German, and Moryc Welt, a Jew, symbolically represent the three most prominent ethnic communities in Lódz. Each of them despises the other groups for various reasons, which, however, does not prevent co-operation if money can be made to common benefit. Despite their different ethnic backgrounds, the three protagonists become business partners and decide to build a factory together.

Notwithstanding all the distrust and social barriers, in Reymont’s novel there is one, yet most powerful uniting factor that melts individuals from different backgrounds into one people: money. At the beginning, Borowiecki, who comes from a Polish aristocratic family, insists on morality in business, which is contrasted with the seemingly much more ruthless attitude of Baum and Welt, who come from families of industrialists. Throughout the course of the novel, however, we learn how Borowiecki gets rid of his aristocratic idealism and, in order to achieve wealth, becomes just as calculating as his business partners. It is represented symbolically by the fact that he rejects his true love for a Polish aristocrat and finally marries the daughter of a rich German industrialist, simply because her dowry will provide him with the money necessary to build a new factory and thus to become rich. In the novel there are other marriages cutting through religious and ethnic boundaries, also contracted for very practical reasons. Intermarriages, hardly possible in the previous aristocratic era, seem to be characteristic of Reymont’s “melting pot” of Lódz.

The concept of American dream proves useful in analysing The Promised Land. The belief that material prosperity can be achieved by everybody is crucial .

Reymont seems to suggest that the desire to become rich and independent is shared by all the inhabitants of Lódz. The dialogue of the three business partners at the very beginning of the novel reveals their absolute conviction that financial success is within their reach:

‘Zakladamy fabryke.’

‘Tak, ja nie mam nic, ty nie masz nic, on nie ma nic’

‘To razem mamy tyle, w sam raz tyle, zeby zalozyc wielka fabryke.’ (Reymont 9)

 

[My translation: ‘We are starting a factory.’

‘Yes, I have nothing, you have nothing, he has nothing.’

‘So together we have enough, just enough to start a big factory.’]

 

This obsession to acquire wealth resembles strikingly the attitude of the protagonists of Theodore Dreiser’s Sister Carrie, who inhabit the turn-of-the-century Chicago. In both Dreiser’s and Reymont’s novels, wealth is the ultimate dream of most characters, and ways of achieving material success are equally important in the Polish and the American story. This analogy between the Polish and the American novels illustrates the rise of global mentality.

One must remember that until the end of the 19th century the richest social group in Poland was nobility. They owed their wealth to hereditary land titles and thus took advantage of their farmers’ work. Aristocrats were also the most cultured stratum of society, and they still believed in the old credo “noblesse oblige”, which obliged them to look after their tenants. In Reymont’s Lódz, it is no longer the aristocrats who are the wealthiest. As in the “melting pot” of America, success does not depend on hereditary titles anymore. The “promised land” offers equal possibilities to everybody. The families of the Jewish and the German protagonists are far more affluent than most Polish aristocrats in the novel. Reymont shows how several aristocratic families are confronted with the new reality, in which their ex-tenants actually buy their property. It is possible because the new economy does not promote humanistic culture and the knowledge of the classics but economic shrewdness and the ability to make money. Moreover, trade as well as business investments prove to be much more profitable than agriculture. Such global tendencies are depicted in the novels of Reymont’s American contemporaries, Upton Sinclair’s The Jungle and Theodore Dreiser’s Sister Carrie.

There are two peasant characters in The Promised Land who symbolically tell the story of the end of an old socio-economic order. One of them is Karczmarek, who realises that his small piece of land, composed mostly of poor, sandy soil, adjoining the ever-growing city of Lódz, will never feed his family properly, not to mention providing substantial wealth. First, traders from Lódz come to his farm to buy sand, which is needed for new textile factories in the city. Karczmarek makes business with them but soon he realises that if he were to sell his sand directly in Lódz he would be much richer. This is why he ventures to rent a carriage and goes to Lódz himself, which proves to be a success since he pockets both the value of sand and the middlemen’s fee. Soon he becomes rich enough to approach his old masters, the Borowiecki family, and buy their mansion together with the land. The aristocratic family are quite shocked that the man whom they had treated as a child and a noble savage has become their equal.

Another interesting aspect of the peasant Karczmarek’s story is the fact that for the purposes of making business in the city he changes his peasant name Karczmarek for Karczmarski, which is a nobleman’s name. He claims that with his peasant name he was not treated with sufficient respect and the moment he introduces himself with the new name, he is immediately addressed as Mr. Karczmarski. This act of self-naming, which was typical of many immigrants to America, symbolises Karczmarek’s social metamorphosis. The new name grants him easier access to the powerful business elite. Karczmarek’s story seems to prove that money could buy nearly everything; nevertheless, in some paradoxical way, social position was still a valued commodity in the society at that time.

Another peasant character is Mr. Wilczek. Wilczek means “a small wolf” in Polish, which clearly refers to the concept of social Darwinism, very popular at that time. Wilczek is a simple and yet clever and shrewd man who has no moral scruples concerning the ways of achieving success. He is interested in money, like most characters in The Promised Land, who seem obsessed with wealth, notwithstanding their social position or nationality. He does not hesitate to resort to slightly dishonest methods. He makes his best business deal by land speculation; he sells a cheaply bought plot of land to a rich German industrialist who is forced to acquire it to expand his factory in order to be able to meet the competition of other industrialists. Many characters in the novel (especially noblemen) disapprove of such a way of making money and consider it immoral. It is common knowledge, however, that many American fortunes were made by land speculation and that in America a person like Wilczek would be admired, if not at least respected. If Wilczek is presented as a morally shady character, Reymont clearly shows that his career and methods are typical of Lódz and most rich industrialists followed a similar career path.

The concept of social Darwinism is also reflected in American literature of that time. Theodore Dreiser in Sister Carrie and Upton Sinclair in The Jungle highlight the survival of the fittest. Similar to The Promised Land, their novels portray the ideology of the ruling classes, emphasising individual responsibility for success or failure. They show clearly that the more liberal and compassionate approach of liberal reformers was totally disregarded; such an attitude certainly made exploitation easier and legitimised the position of the ruling class.

Wilczek’s weekend visit to his home village illustrates vividly his social promotion. His new self is reflected in his physical appearance and behaviour. Everybody in the village notices how elegant his clothes are, how nice he smells. His humbleness towards his old masters has disappeared; he walks very straight and meets the eyes of the aristocrats boldly, if not with open defiance. In his village, Wilczek is a walking advertisement of the possibilities offered by the new socio-economic order. It is men like Wilczek that fuel the ever-growing migration of poor farmers to the city of Lódz. His example is so powerful because he used to be just a shepherd; his fellow villagers still remember his earlier self very well and are shocked by the stark contrast. Wilczek and Karczmarek are clearly self-made men, typical of the “melting pot” society, be it turn-of-the-century America or Reymont’s Lódz.

Reymont’s novel introduces a new type of character, the so called Lodzermensch, who is an embodiment of the American dream myth. Virtually, the only thing that matters for a Lodzermensch is, again, material success, whereas moral behaviour is only an obstacle. One of the aristocrats in The Promised Land describes Wilczek vividly:

Jest to kombinacja plazu i dzikiego zwierzecia. Tacy w zyciu dochodza do wszystkiego, o ile zbyt predko nie skoncza w wiezieniu. (Reymont 404)

 

[My translation: He is a combination of an amphibian and a wild animal Such people achieve everything in life, unless they end up in prison quickly.]

 

Very often throughout the novel people talk of the “Lódz morality”, which paradoxically stands for immoral behaviour. The Lodzermensch do not hesitate to burn his own factory if he can gain more by getting compensation from an insurance company. It is interesting how Borowiecki illustrates the prevailing ethics of Lódz:

Lódz to las, puszcza – masz mocne pazury, to idz smialo i bezwzglednie, dus bliznich, bo inaczej oni cie zdusza, wyssaja i wypluja z siebie.

 

[My translation: Lódz is a forest, a jungle – if your paws are strong, go ahead boldly and ruthlessly, strangle your fellow people because otherwise they will strangle you, suck you and spit you out.]

 

In the course of The Promised Land Borowiecki loses the remnants of aristocratic idealism. He is a new type of character in Polish fiction because until the end of the 19th century an idealistic patriot was the prevailing model (see Micinska). The Promised Land leaves no doubts about the future of the characters who try to avoid morally dubious methods in the wild, capitalistic world: they are doomed to fail in the ruthless environment. The metaphor of the jungle that Borowiecki uses to describe turn-of-the-century Lódz is also used in Upton Sinclair’s The Jungle, which depicts Chicago as a wild, inhuman environment. Both novels emphasise the ferocious, aggressive aspects of life in an industrial city at that time, the survival of the fittest characteristic of social Darwinism.

The Lodzermensch feels good in the capitalistic society but he is also aware of the challenges of the global economy. On several occasions we learn that the price of textiles produced in the factories of Lódz depends on various tariffs, the price of raw cotton in Russia, and paints from Germany. The competition is not only fierce in industry. At some point in the novel a landowner talking about his crops exclaims: “Pan wie jaka konkurencje robi nam Ameryka?” (Reymont 296) [My translation: You know how America competes with us?] An industrialist asks his future worker: “Pan umiesz po angielsku?” (Reymont 294) [My translation: Can you speak English?] in order to make sure that he will be able to correspond with their business partners worldwide.

The global aspect, however, is not only manifest in competition in the capitalist environment. It also stands for the temptations of the interconnected world and is evident in status symbols that most characters in the novel try to acquire. Therefore, the mansions of rich industrialists abound in Chinese rooms, Indian mats, bamboo furniture and silk pillows. Their gardens boast collections of exotic animals while their owners parade through the (poorly paved) streets of Lódz in carriages drawn by expensive horses, imported from America.

The need to compete on the international scene makes the Lodzermensch even more ruthless and forces him to exploit his workers. The Lodzermensch, however, never worries about deaths in factories. After an accident, seeing blood stains on the cloth, he complains: “Tyle materialu na nic!” (Reymont 117) [My translation: So much material wasted!] or, talking about other killed workers: “Co mi to szkodzi, tego towaru nigdy nie brakuje” (Reymont 253) [My translation: Oh, this is no problem. There is never a shortage of this commodity]. The descriptions of the conditions of life of the working class mirror those from Sinclair’s The Jungle and Dreiser’s Sister Carrie. Reymont, just as Sinclair and Dreiser, portrays the city as the ever-hungry monster feeding on people, who thus become nothing but manure.

In The Promised Land Reymont shows a career path pattern characteristic of turn-of-the-century America. All the richest industrialists in the novel (e.g., Jew Mendelsohn or German Mueller) illustrate the “from rags to riches” success story. They start their career in poverty but because of their perseverance and hard work become respectable and envied citizens. A perfect analogy in American literature would be Horatio Alger’s Ragged Dick, in which the initially homeless eponymous hero slowly lifts himself and finally manages to become a respectable bank clerk.

In my paper, I have tried to show that the microcosm of Reymont’s ‘promised land’ is ruled by the same mechanisms as the U.S. in the beginning of the 20th century. The metaphor of the “melting pot” illustrates the social reality presented in Reymont’s novel, in which ethnic boundaries become blurred. Most protagonists in The Promised Land could be characterised by the “American dream” mentality as they seem to believe that success is within their reach. Like America, Lódz is represented as a promised land where Germans, Jews and Poles try their luck and are not assessed on the basis of their racial or cultural heritage. Social Darwinism, striking in many American novels of the period, seems the most powerful factor governing Reymont’s Lódz as well. Career paths presented in The Promised Land appear to reflect the American “from rags to riches” myth. Comparison of Reymont’s novel with fiction by his American contemporaries such as Dreiser and Sinclair reveals interesting correspondences. Finally, the use of concepts such as the “promised land”, the “melting pot”, the “American dream” and “social Darwinism” usually applied to American society, highlights the global aspects of Reymont’s novel.

 

 

BIBLIOGRAPHY:

Dreiser, Theodeore. Sister Carrie. New York: Penguin Books, 2000.

Krzyzanowski, Jerzy R. “Reymont w Stanach Zjednocznonych”. Legenda Somosierry in inne

prace krytyczne. Warszawa: Czytelnik: 1987: 61-72.

Krzyzanowski, Jerzy R. “Ziemia obiecana – powiesc nowoczesna”. Legenda Somosierry in

inne prace krytyczne. Warszawa: Czytelnik: 1987: 53-60.

Micinska, Magdalena. Miedzy Królem Duchem a mieszczaninem. Obraz bohatera

narodowego w pismiennictwie polskim przelomu XIX i XX w. (1890-1914). Wroclaw:

Fundac ja na Rzecz Nauki Polskiej, 1995.

Reymont, Wladyslaw St.. Ziemia obiecana. Warszawa: Prószynski i S-ka, 2000.

Rurawski, Józef. Wladyslaw Reymont. Warszawa: Wiedza Powszechna, 1977.

Sinclair, Upton. The Jungle. New York: Penguin Books, 1990.

Sztachelska, Jolanta. “Reymont czyli oko pisarza”. Reporteryje i Reportaze. Bialystok:

Wydawnictwo Filii Uniwersytetu Warszawskiego, 1997: 115-184