O polskich biografach Chopina w XIX w. [On Chopin’s nineteenth-century Polish biographers] by Professor Magdalena Dziadek is new publication by the Fryderyk Chopin Society in the series Chopin. Konteksty (‘Chopin: contexts’).

This book discusses nineteenth-century Polish biographers of Fryderyk Chopin. The author synthesises the approaches adopted by those biographers, including Józef Sikorski, Ferdynand Hoesick and Maurycy Karasowski. Although they are well known in the field of Chopin studies, Magdalena Dziadek’s publication offers the first comprehensive study of their work.

‘Today, with the possibility of looking at Chopin and his music from a more distant perspective, we have the chance […] to create grand syntheses. […] These works would not have been written were it not for the efforts of nineteenth-century biographers and critics. In a sense, of course, their output is dated – we find it impossible today to genuinely succumb to the stream of sentimentality that inundates the digressions of Karasowski, Kleczyński, Tarnowski, Przybyszewski, Hoesick and Strzelecki. Yet while lamenting the tragic fortunes of our great composer, they safeguarded a huge part of the Chopin legacy for posterity’ – excerpt from the introduction.