Tadeusz Różewicz and Images That Move

My aim in this article is to present ways of understanding mental images in Tadeusz Różewicz's poetry. Mental images constitute an important element of Różewicz's reflections. He may have occasionally described them as meaningless; however, they are constitutive of his poems. To demonstrate their essential role, I address the following issues: first, the approach that treats the internal image as a “null-medium”; second, the sense-forming potential of such images; third, paradoxes of clear and transparent images; and finally, their performative power. I argue that specifically understood imagery, highly valued by Różewicz, enables the creation of social relations and conditions the production of meanings that cannot be reduced to the linguistic order.