The Review of Contemporary Fiction

Bacacay, by Witold Gombrowicz, translated by Bill Johnston
reviewed by Michael Pinker

Witold Gombrowicz. Bacacay. Trans. Bill Johnston. Archipelago, 2004. 275 pp. $26.00.

The last of Gombrowicz’s books to appear in Poland in his lifetime, Bacacay includes the collection of seven stories that established his reputation, two “freestanding” chapters from Ferdydurke, and three uncollected stories. In each, the narrator’s bizarre interpretation of his interlocutors’ intentions shifts narrative interest from his story to himself, often to wildly absurd effect. The opening septet amply displays this zany penchant for extravagant perspicacity. In “Lawyer Kraykowski’s Dancer,” a brief altercation impels an epileptic theatergoer to presume an attachment with his antagonist that leads him to shadow this “guiding star’s” movements, going so far as to intervene in a romantic intrigue. “The Memoirs of Stefan Czarniecki” reveals the young nobleman in the throes of an ineffable mystery, retracing his passage from youthful idealism to dissipation, attributing to his mixed parentage a pervading unease that overcomes every scruple. When in “A Premeditated Crime” an investigating magistrate, invited to a noble home to discuss a property matter, learns his client has died before his arrival, piqued by the family’s otherwise unaccountable conduct, he suspects foul play. Reveling in the heady atmosphere of “Dinner at Countess Pavahoke’s,” a fawning bourgeois becomes so captivated by the rarified habits of the aristocracy that, when their behavior takes an unexpectedly louche turn, his mortification scales dizzying heights. The heroine of “Virginity,” struck by a fragment of brick thrown by a hobo, discloses unsettling urges that startle her fiancé’s studied raptures over unsullied innocence. An unlikely series of madcap voyages and hairsbreadth escapes force upon the unwitting hero of “Adventure” the realization that his singular destiny eludes characterization. Finally, “The Events on the Banbury” resembles an extended Monty Python skit, as hilarious repartee undercuts the protagonist’s repeated episodes of shipboard discomfiture. These early stories herald Gombrowicz’s later, lengthier sallies, in a style burlesque and baroque at once.