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Revision as of 18:12, 22 October 2006
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| Author | Jerzy Kosiński |
|---|---|
| Language | English |
| Subject | World War II, Poland |
| Publisher | Houghton Mifflin |
| Publication date | 1967 |
| Media type | Novel |
| Followed by | Steps (1969) |
The Painted Bird is a controversial 1965 novel by Jerzy Kosiński which describes the world as seen by a young black-haired, black-eyed boy who wanders about small towns scattered around Central or Eastern Europe (presumably Poland) during World War II.
Background
According to James Park Sloan, some readers initially assumed that Kosiński had written an autobiography, due to "claims" made by the author himself. . Elie Wiesel acclaimed the book as "one of the best indictments of the Nazi era, written with deep sincerity and sensitivity." Cynthia Ozick stated she immediately recognized Kosiński's authenticity as "a Jewish survivor and witness to the Holocaust." However it later became clear that Kosiński was neither the boy in the story nor did he share any of the boy's experiences, as revealed in a series of articles in newspapers and books. Norman G. Filkenstein in his VPL lecture broadcasted by the Canadian Shaw Cable in 2006 refers to the book as a "hoax".
Eliot Weinberger has claimed that Kosiński was not the author of the book. Weinberger alleged that Kosinski used several editors to rewrite passages, as - according to Weinberger - he had very little fluent knowledge of English at the time of its writing.
Themes
The book describes the boy's encounter with peasants engaged in all forms of sexual and social deviance such as incest, bestiality and rape, and in a huge amount of violence – often at the expense of the child. While the book has been said to depict peasants in a derogatory fashion, some argue that it was not a particular social group, but all people, who are viewed as inherently predisposed to cruelty.
The title is drawn from an analogy to human life, described within the book. The boy finds himself in the company of a professional bird catcher. When the man is particularly upset or bored, he takes one of his captured birds and paints it several colors. Then he watches the bird fly through the air in search of a flock of its kin. When it comes upon them, they see it as an intruder and tear at the bird until it dies, falling from the sky.
Criticism
Some argue that the novel has contributed to false impressions of East European peasants. To others, the purpose of the book, from a deontological standpoint, was not to depict the cruelty of one group of people but to show the nature of all humanity, and of all existence, to be cruel.
Nevertheless, the book deeply offended the members of the Polish farming family who had risked their lives to save Kosiński during the Holocaust.
See also
Sources
- James Park Sloan, Jerzy Kosinski: A Biography, Dutton, United States, 1996
- Village Voice, June 1982.
- Eliot Weinberger Genuine Fakes from his collection Karmic Traces; New Directions, 2000.
- Kosinski, Jerzy. The Painted Bird, Grove Press, 1995, ISBN 0-8021-3422-X.