ABSTRACT
At first glance, the fact that Joseph Boruwłaski left behind a sizeable set of published memoirs (the first version of which is included in the present volume) might seem to make the historian’s task of retracing his life and fortunes relatively easy. He even revised and expanded his written recollections several times to include subsequent years. Nonetheless, for the careful and cautious historian the job in fact proves to be much harder, despite this relatively plentiful material. Boruwłaski’s autobiographical writings need to be taken with a considerable grain of salt, so to speak, especially in this later period – when it seems the author wished to portray his life according to a certain image he had always held in his imagination, omitting many events, distorting others, and quite simply fabricating still others. He moreover sometimes dates events inaccurately, or more often (wanting to additionally cover up his real tracks?) he cautiously avoids giving any dating whatsoever. Admittedly, the earlier edition of the memoirs does represent a more credible historical source (although as we will discuss below, it too represents a kind of literary creation, and quite a successful one at that). When this first portion was initially published, nearly all the individuals involved in the depicted events were still alive and the memoirs were even expressly addressed to some of them, hence the stories are naturally retold more scrupulously and accurately. But this portion unfortunately goes no further than 1788–1790.
