Preparing my book on the dramas of Karol Wojtyła I had the opportunity to work at the Center for Documentation and Research of the Pontificate of John Paul II in Rome. An extensive library and a valuable collection of newspaper clippings from around the world were gathered here. They helped me to enrich my work with information that is rarely attainable by a Polish researcher. This primarily concerned the foreign performances of Karol Wojtyła’s theatre and radio pieces and also the numerous translations of his works into foreign languages. For those wanting to know and understand the teaching of Pope John Paul II, it is important to know his playwriting because, as he repeatedly emphasized, the theatre had been his first love, before “his priestly vocation matured in him”. The theatre was also a kind of preparation for the pastoral work.
Wojtyła since early high school years performed at Wadowice scenes and often co-directed performances that were staged there, but it was an experience gained during the studies of Polish language and during the occupation that really had the dominant influence on the development of his dramatic style. It was then that he discovered the theatre as “a mystery of the word”. In this way he recalled this process in his book Gift and Mystery: “As I came to appreciate the power of the word in my literary and linguistic studies, I inevitably drew closer to the mystery of the Word – that Word of which we speak every day in the Angelus: “And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us” (Jn 1:14). Later I came to realize that my study of Polish language and letters had prepared the ground for a different kind of interest and study. It had prepared me for an encounter with philosophy and theology”. At first, Karol Wojtyła developed the exploration of the mystery of the word on the poetic and dramatic plane. He co-founded in 1941 within an underground movement the Rhapsodic Theatre. He not only was one of the leading actors in the theatre (during the occupation), but also participated in the formation of its ideological assumptions.
The ties that bound Wojtyła to this scene, resulted, among others, in deep, long-standing friendship with Mieczysław Kotlarczyk, the main founder and director of the Rhapsodic Theatre.
During World War II, forced to flee from Wadowice, Kotlarczyk settled in an apartment of his younger friend, Karol Wojtyła, in Krakow, where during joint discussions they were working out principles of a new style on stage. Assuming that the basic, primary element of drama is a word, not a movement, Kotlarczyk initiated activity of the theatre in which a spectacular part was reduced, and the performance was focused on the recitation of poetry or epic text. Simplicity and asceticism of spectacles, initially resulting from both the assumptions and the harsh underground conditions (staging in private homes, lacking in decoration and costumes), with time were considered as an element helping to give the performance an atmosphere of mystery.
After starting his studies in the underground seminary of the Archdiocese of Krakow, Karol Wojtyła gave up the playing in the spectacles of the theatre created by Kotlarczyk. But his passion for theatre was revealed many times during his life in various forms (while studying in Rome, he directed a performance prepared by the seminar students; he also organized a parish theatre in Niegowić and wrote under the pseudonym reviews of the spectacles of the Rhapsodic Theatre etc.)
Most important, however, were his own dramatic texts. He created six pieces, beginning writing them in the first months of the German occupation. The first drama titled David (Dawid) went missing during the war. The next two: Hiob (Job) (1939) and Jeremiasz (Jeremiah) (1940) alluded to the stories of the Bible, but were in fact reflections on the tragic fate of Poland.
Three mature dramas of Wojtyla: Our God’s Brother (Brat naszego Boga) (1944-1950), The Jeweler’s Shop (Przed sklepem jubilera) (1960) and Radiation of Fatherhood (Promieniowanie ojcostwa) (1964) are testimonies of already conscious and consistent implementation of the convention of a poor and formally ascetic theatre. Our God’s Brother is a story about Adam Chmielowski, a well-known painter from Krakow, who matures to abandon his artistic career and to sacrifice his life to the poor, in whom he sees Christ. The hero is struggling with his thoughts and desires, and finally chooses, as he says himself: “more freedom”, takes the name of Brother Albert and resides with the homeless in a shelter for the homeless men. It is not difficult to find in this text an evidence of the young Karol Wojtyła’s own searchings when he had to make a choice between the theatrical and the priestly vocation. This drama is also a kind of analysis of the causes that led to the outbreak of the revolution.
The staging of the drama The Jeweler’s Shop performed by the artists of the Dramatic Theatre in Wałbrzych. (A photo from the archives of CDRP)
The next two works of priest Karol Wojtyła are closer to meditation than to a traditional drama such as we see most often in a theatre. The author limits the action, and the actors primarily have to consider some problems than to play an imaginary story. The Jeweler’s Shop shows the way of love of three pairs. Radiation of Fatherhood, which is a kind of mystery, concentrates on its characters’ reflection on the essence of their being in freedom that is complemented by an apparent resignation from some freedom, by becoming a someone’s father, a someone’s child, a mother.
Directors, deciding to stage any of the plays by John Paul II, from the beginning had to challenge a difficult task. The texts of a meditative character seemed too difficult and inadequate to the expectations of modern audiences, accustomed to fast action and pageantry. Quite often in Poland as well as in other countries attempts were made to dynamise by various means performances based on these texts. Thanks to research materials collected at the Center for Documentation and Research of the Pontificate of John Paul II it was possible for me to reach many reviews of theatre performances and also to see how dramatic texts of Karol Wojtyla worked very well around the world in the form of radio plays. The drama The Jeweler’s Shop alone was broadcasted in national languages in at least eleven countries.
The archives at the via Cassia 1200 in Rome still include many materials that can be used to get to know the teaching of John Paul II and the reception of his works around the world. For researchers of the Polish Pope’s thought such a place is invaluable.
Anna Kołodziejska