The Politics of Love: The “Enthusiasts” and Feminism in Nineteenth-Century Poland

The decades between Poland’s two great uprisings (in 1830-1831 and 1863) were marked by imperial repression of Polish cultural and political life. Polish intellectual circles nevertheless flourished at home and abroad, albeit covertly. Narcyza Żmichowska led a group of educated women known as the “Enthusiasts” (Entuzjastki), who were united by their commitment to live as independent women despite the intense nationalism that put the nation above all—including class and gender. The Enthusiasts emphasized sororal love and homosocial bonding in their program to contest both an oppressive imperial regime and constrictive gender roles. Their affective relationships with each other, as well as the decision to remain unmarried, childless or divorced, violated accepted conventions and, especially, the patriotic emphasis on the Polish family. This dissertation draws upon a large corpus of letters, diaries, police files, and published works from across Europe; it examines the Enthusiast movement from its emergence in the 1840s to the death of its most notorious public figure and writer, Narcyza Żmichowska, in 1876. The project demonstrates how Polish women appropriated and contributed ideas about women’s emancipation, nationalism and religion in a globalizing era of increasing literacy and transnational exchange. It shows how the Polish intelligentsia was so monomaniacally focused on the national question and the struggle for independence that discussion of other social questions was dismissed as “unpatriotic.” Polish nationalists demanded that women do their part by remaining at home and raising children to love and sacrifice for the fatherland. When Polish women acted outside of these precepts, as did the Enthusiasts, they met with derision despite their explicit support for the national cause. This study emphasizes the limitations of nationalism as a binding agent, especially for those dismissed as socially deviant. It contributes to debates on feminism and nationalism and makes a critical contribution to the field of European women’s history.