Issue editor: Mariusz Finkielsztein
This issue of State of Affairs deals with the rarely researched and seldom considered issue of boredom. The topic is discussed from both the psychological and philosophical perspective (Cioran, Sartre, and Pessoa) and in regard to the social understanding of this concept in the present day, the role of boredom in science, and boredom’s connection with disgust. The repressive nature of rest cure therapy is presented using the example of Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s story “The Yellow Wallpaper.” Boredom in the prose of Jerzy Andrzejewski and Witold Gombrowicz is also analysed.
The issue includes a record of the Florian Znaniecki Colloquium with Hubert Knoblauch, an innovative continuator of Berger and Luckmann’s theories in The Social Construction of Reality. The issue closes with an extensive review section, including two essays on Marcin Napiórkowski’s book Powstanie umarłych, concerning memory of the Warsaw Uprising from 1944 to the present day, as well as the author’s response.