When Tadeusz Róewicz’s plays began appearing in the early 1960’s, he was already a famous and prolific poet—one of the most influential of the postwar period in Polish literature—as well as a short-story writer. His poetry, prose, and drama are all interconnected. Róewicz himself has stated that some of his poems are minidramas, written in preparation for his plays. Thus, The Card Index is clearly related to the famous poem “Ocalony” (1947; “The Survivor,” 1976). Similarly, The Witnesses seems to have developed from the poem Zielona róa (1961; Green Rose, 1982). His first two volumes of lyrics, Niepokój (1947; Unease, 1980) and Czerwona rn kawiczka (1948; the red glove), are funeral laments over those who perished in World War II, laments expressed through a new kind of “antipoetic” poetry. Volumes of the late 1960’s, such as Twarz trzecia (1968; the third face) and especially Regio (1969), contain new elements of an existential and philosophical nature.

Like his poetry, Róewicz’s prose is concerned with psychological analysis. A recurring theme is the contrast between the moral and spiritual emptiness of the present and the horror of wartime and occupation. This theme appears in the title story of a collection of five stories, Wycieczka do muzeum (1966; an excursion to a museum). Róewicz’s most important piece of fiction is his novel mier w starych dekoracjach (1970; death amid old stage props), which exhibits a traditional Polish theme of the hero who travels outside his native land and discovers himself in the process of his encounter with the West.

Tadeusz Róewicz is considered one of the most outstanding and influential twentieth century Polish playwrights. Together with his younger colleague, Sawomir Mroek, Róewicz has been perhaps the postwar Polish playwright best known abroad. Most important, three of his major dramas have been acknowledged as contemporary classics: The Card Index, The Witnesses, and The Old Woman Broods. In postwar Polish poetry, Róewicz has been considered a renewer of poetic expression through his use of simple, colloquial, and even harsh words, as well as his emphasis on the themes of the horror of war and the corruption of human values. By the time he turned to drama in the 1960’s, Róewicz had established a new kind of “antipoetic” poetry and had become the spokesperson for the wartime and postwar experiences of an entire generation.

Róewicz has regularly upset critics and audiences because of his constant exploration of dramatic form. He has refused to remain identified with any one type of drama. Róewicz himself has said that he considers all of his work to be a continuous polemic with contemporary theater. Although some of his early plays have been described as employing a “collage technique” or as having an “open form” (a phrase coined by Róewicz himself), neither of these categories applies to all of his dramas. Nevertheless, certain aesthetic and ethical constants seem to exist in Róewicz’s dramaturgy. His plays often present a multileveled reality. This may be expressed through an expansion of the stage directions, through different modes of existence being present simultaneously on stage, or through discontinuity of time and juxtaposition of unconnected situations on stage. Although his plays are never moralizing, they often have profound ethical dimensions. Róewicz’s hero is frequently a kind of contemporary Everyman who is, to some degree, the author, a participant, and a commentator on the events occurring around him. In his greatest plays, the ethical dimension of the content is as important as the avant-garde form of the work. An assessment of Róewicz’s dramatic output is also complicated by certain factors. Many of his initially innovative...