The “Legiony” (Legions) Project. On Henryk Sienkiewicz’s final novel

Abstract

The archived rough draft of Legiony, the last novel by Henryk Sienkiewicz, contains 139 separate pages, including drafts of textual varieties, subsequent variants, and the printed version. The diverse material and the remaining writer’s notes enabled the researcher to present the author’s writing methods and his dilemmas. The rich collection of letters was the source of additional facts on his writing process. Similarly to other creative situations, Henryk Sienkiewicz worked in his characteristic way on the concept of the crucial fragments as well as on the mode of narration.