Potocki, Wacław

▪ Polish poet

born 1621, Wola Łużeńska, Poland

died July 9, 1696, Łużna

      Polish poet well known for his epic poetry and for his collection of epigrams.

      Potocki, a country squire with little formal education, wrote most of his verse (about 300,000 lines) to please himself. A Unitarian, he was given a choice between exile and conversion to Roman Catholicism when a decree banished all Unitarians from Poland. He chose reluctantly to convert but his wife refused, and he spent many years fearing for her life.

      Potocki authored a vigorous epic poem, Transakcja wojny chocimskiej (“The Conduct of the Chocim War”), finished in 1670. It was not published until 1850, as Wojna chocimska. The epic describes the defense in 1621 of the city of Chocim by 65,000 Poles and Cossacks against a Turkish army estimated at 400,000. Historically accurate, though it idealizes the Polish heroes, Wojna chocimska reveals Potocki's gift for poetic condensation.

      Potocki was also famous for his epigrams, collected in Ogród fraszek (“Garden of Rhymes,” written 1670–95; published 1907), which give a lively picture of ideas and manners among the gentry at a time of political and religious conflict.

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