Pol, Wincenty

Born Apr. 20, 1807, in Lublin; died Dec. 2, 1872, in Kraków. Polish poet.

Pol studied at the University of L’vov. In 1831 he served in the Polish insurgent army. From 1849 to 1852 he was a professor of geography in Kraków. Pol’s works of the 1830’s are noted for their democratic sentiments. He gave poetic expression to the patriotism of soldiers in the melodious and artless Songs of Janusz (1833) and the narrative poem in the form of a monologue (gawęda) Sergeant Major Dorosz in Lithuania (1833, published 1854). He is also the author of the narrative poems The Story of the Cobbler Jan Kiliński (1833; published 1843) and The Song of Our Land (1835; published 1843). In the 1840’s, Pol became an opponent of the democratic movement and idealized the feudal past, as in the narrative poem Mohort (1855).