Anti-Polonism in Russian literature.

I even don't mean Fedya Dostoyevsky with his berserk Polonophobia.
All Polish characters of his novels are low-lives good for extermination only. lol

But look at these names of great, talented and mostly honest people:
Pushkin, Tutchev, Gogol, both Tolstoys, Bestuzhev, Leskov, Bulkhakov etc.etc.

With few exceptions they didn't have any true reasons justyfying their "sky is the limit" level of anti-Polish feelings but all of them were by far more anti-Polish than even Czarist politicians !

Why ?!
Because of their Russian chauvinism ?
Because of the standard brainwashing in sense of the III Rome mission ?
Did any of these "prophets" get paid for their histeria ?

What was behind the the never ending Poland-hatred among Russian intellectual elite ?
Pan-slavism and anti-Catholicism ?

As if there was no Russophobia in Polish literature. Our countries have usually seen each other as enemies and enemies rarely talk well of each other.

Borrka, the differences between Prawosławny/Orthodox and Catholicism are not that great when cast alongside Islam and Hinduism, for example. I don't think religion played a major part. If it did, it would have been preferential treatment for one group at the expense of the other or some behind-the-scenes dealings by the Vatican.

The Russian elite saw the Polish elite as an emerging threat. That's why Katyń happened. They were singled out as those that could expose them and thus had to be dealt with.

Also, they can more freely distort history. Politicians have to be more tactful and can be hauled over the coals for tactlessness. They are much more in the public eye.

Please present some ideas and views of the abovementioned authors, Borrka. You are a well-read man so I assume that you can. What I tend to find is that Poles and Russians tend to look for messages which aren't really there. A neutral and disaffected reader won't look too much into it or for it. Some passages would be nice, thanks.

Actually I find Dostoyevski's descriptions about Poles quite accurate although evil,I mean from a negative point of view.

You're an idiot, i realise its a cheap provocation on your part but you're still an idiot Southern.

As for why Dostoyevski hated Poles, he came into contact with Polish nobility sent into Russian interior, these people looked down on Russians as primitive, he viewed them as the least Slavic (and in that he was right) of all Slavic people and for him they carried all the sins of the "West" but because they were Slavic it was that much worse for him.

He did not hate Poles,he describes them from a russian point of view.

There is no russian point of view, there's the goverments view.

A couple of times, Poles appear in Crime & Punishment, a book I admire and have enjoyed reading more than once. There are a couple of very minor characters who are always described as little Poles. Maybe they were supposed to be Polish and just coincidentally little. At the end of the book, the (anti-) hero of the story witnesses a mix of typical Russian criminals and Polish political prisoners in a Siberian prison camp, neither of whom are looked on particularly favourably although the Russians not quite so unfavourably. This may be based on Dostoevsky's own experience in a Siberian prison. Other foreigners in his work also seem to be portrayed somewhat negatively - Germans and Finns and so on.

I don't remember any references to Poles in the work of Gogol, but I haven't read everything by him. I am the king of Spain, by the way.


It seems all to often that we notice Russian popular opinion following the government line. However, if we look at the literatrure of the past and the country's history, we can see that things haven't always been quite so straightforward, although this does seem to be a recurring theme.

Seanus there is no need for any great differences between religions to create conflicts and the best example is the Anglican Church versus Vatican or in general main forms of Protestantism as confronted with Catholicism.

Catholic versus Orthodoxy was an issue for hundreds years, perhaps of less importance today.
But there was always a lot of politics behind religion.


I would be very careful linking Katyn to Russian problems with Polish elite.
For sur there is some Russian responsibility for crimes of communism but frankly they have lost any control over it.
Remember Goethe's "Der Zauberlehrling" ?


Are you expecting a PhD work in field of Russian literature from me lol ?
I've got some better idea.
Just read this lecture on Pushkin - it's exactly the way (many) Poles are thinking about Russian intelligentsia's attitude towards Poland.
Great reading:
https://books.google.pl/books?id=ZhWR_QrNxF8C&pg=PA59&lpg=PA59&dq=Pushkin,+borodino&source=bl&ots=1ruRGH0aUf&sig=zJt6yqT7Y5Tl_pBTq7IQ_1r8dRo&hl=pl&ei=Grb_SuGhDZyb_QbW27mKCw&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result#v=onepage&q=Pushkin%2C%20borodino&f=false

Any questions - you're welcomed.

I am honored to have meet you, your majesty.

I wish your country send back all thoose Norwegians living there! =)