Mikołaj Rej or Mikołaj Rey of Nagłowice (4 February 1505 – between 8 September and 5 October 1569) was a Polish poet, prose writer, politician, and musician of the early Polish Renaissance. He was the first major author to write exclusively in the Polish language and is regarded, alongside Biernat of Lublin and Jan Kochanowski, as one of the founders of Polish literary language and literature.

Life

Rej was born into the minor Polish nobility (ziemiaństwo), of the Oksza coat of arms, at Żurawno near Halicz. His father Stanisław, described as "a pious, honourable, and quiet man", had moved to Ruthenia from Nagłowice near Kraków, with the assistance of a relative who was Archbishop of Lwów. His mother, Barbara Herburt, became Stanisław's second wife after he settled there. Although the young Rej received little formal education in Lwów and attended the Kraków Academy for only a single year at the age of thirteen, he largely educated himself through the study of Latin literature. and it also was noted that his grandson, Andrzej Rej (diplomat), royal secretary and Calvinist, is Mikolaj's most prominent offspring. That grandson may be the subject of the 1637 painting by Rembrandt, A Polish Nobleman (perhaps, painted while he was visiting Amsterdam during a trip as a Polish ambassador on a diplomatic mission to the courts of the Danish, the English, and the Dutch).

Works

thumb|right|200px|The Image of a Good Man's Life (1567)

In 1543 Rej debuted as a writer, under the pen name "Ambroży Korczbok Rożek," with his most famous book, A Brief Discussion among Three Persons: a Lord, a Commune Chief, and a Priest (Krotka rozprawa między trzemi osobami, panem, woytem a plebanem).

Rej's works touch on a large array of matters. He authored prose works that described the ideal of the Polish nobleman, criticized the Catholic Church, and showed a genuine solicitude for his country. His prose syntax is strongly influenced by Latin style.

His poetic meter discloses a deliberate effort to impart to the medieval metrical model with which he was so familiar, a regularity that it lacked. Rej's works include:

  • Krótka rozprawa między trzema osobami: Panem, Wójtem i Plebanem (A Brief Discourse among Three Persons: a Lord, a Commune Chief, and a Priest, 1543), written under the pen name, Ambroży Korczbok Rożek
  • Żywot Józefa (The Life of Joseph, 1545).
  • Żywot Człowieka Poczciwego (The Life of the Honest Man)
  • Kupiec (The Merchant, 1549)
  • Zwierzyniec (The Bestiary, 1562)
  • Zwierciadło (Speculum), incorporating the three-book prose Wizerunek własny żywota człowieka poczciwego (The Image of a Good Man's Life, 1567–68)
  • Rzecz pospolita albo Sejm pospolity (The Commonwealth, or the General Sejm)

Quotation

Legacy

100px|thumb|[[Oksza coat of arms|Oksza coat-of-arms, hereditary in Rej's family]]

In commemoration of the five-hundredth anniversary of the birth of Mikołaj Rej, Poland's Sejm (parliament) declared 2005 to be the Year of Mikołaj Rej.

In 1994–97, Rej's descendant and namesake, Nicholas Andrew Rey (1938–2009), served as American Ambassador to Poland.

See also

  • Polish literature
  • List of Polish poets
  • List of Poles

Notes

References

  • Czesław Miłosz, The History of Polish Literature, University of California Press, 1984; .
  • A Short Conversation Between Three Persons, a Squire, a Bailiff, and a Parson (selections) by Michał J. Mikoś
  • Life of an honest man (selections) by Michał J. Mikoś
  • Collected works