The Play <i>A Maiden’s Love</i> by Maria Kuncewiczowa as an Example of a Representation of the Subject of Abortion in Polish Interwar Theatre

Abstract Reproductive rights in Poland have been subject to fight for more than a hundred years. Since Polish independence in 1918, the topic of abortion has been present in literary forms of female artistic expression. One such play is A Maiden’s Love written by Maria Kuncewiczowa in 1932. The protagonist, a young woman named Inka, faces a weighty choice of whether to maintain the pregnancy having been left alone with this decision by her partner. In 1932 the piece was staged in Teatr Maly in Warsaw and widely discussed in the newspapers and magazines. It was also a year when a new penal code was established and abortion was criminalized. The Maiden’s Love conveys that theater can be considered as a form of social relation and that it is inherently interwoven with socio-political and economic discourse. In this paper, I would like to analyse Kuncewiczowa’s strategies for representing the subject of abortion as well as the reception and the critical discourse around of the play from Teatr Maly. I would also like to demonstrate the political potentialites in melodrama.