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Sclavus, Wiesław [Wacław Gąsiorowski], *Anarchists* [1906]
Title: Anarchists.
Author: Wiesław Sclavus [Wacław Gąsiorowski (1869–1939)—novelist, journalist, and columnist; independence activist and member of the Polish diaspora; the pseudonym “Wiesław Sclavus” revealed on the title page].
Publisher: Lviv, Księgarnia Polska B. Połoniecki.
Year of publication: 1906.
Format: 20 cm.
Volume: [2], 304 pp.
Binding: original period half-leather.
The novel was published in Lviv in 1906, during the 1905–1907 revolution in the Russian partition, by Bernard Połoniecki’s Księgarnia Polska. The author’s pen name appears on the title page. Under this pseudonym, Gąsiorowski also published *Ugodowcy* (1901), *Królobójcy* (1905), and *Finis Poloniae* (1906). Bernard Połoniecki (1861–1943) ran Księgarnia Polska from 1889 onward and developed it into a large enterprise with a modern printing press and bookbinding workshop. The company published the largest number of Young Poland poetry collections in Lviv, including works by Leopold Staff, Jan Kasprowicz, and Kornel Makuszyński.
Wacław Gąsiorowski, born Jan Wacław (1869–1939), was born in Warsaw and died in Konstancin. Orphaned at an early age, he began working to earn a living at the age of 15 and acquired his knowledge on his own. He worked as a pharmacist’s assistant—an experience he described in his novel *Pigularz* (1900)—and served for just under two years in the Tsarist army. In 1900, he published and edited the magazine *Strumień*. After publishing the anti-tsarist work *Ugodowcy*, printed under the pseudonym Wiesław Sclavus, his identity was exposed by the Russian Okhrana. He fled the Kingdom and spent three years in Lviv; from 1904 onward, he lived in Paris. He wrote historical novels centered on the Napoleonic epic and the November Uprising, including *Huragan*, *The Black General*, and *The Guard Light Cavalry*, as well as novels on contemporary themes. From 1921 to 1930, he resided in the United States, and in 1938 he received the Eliza Orzeszkowa Award for his life’s work.
Provenance: no old institutional stamps or ownership markings. The only trace of previous circulation is small, clean holes in the paper running through the folds to the middle of the block.
An item for collectors of 19th- and 20th-century prose, admirers of Gąsiorowski’s work, and collectors of prints from the Lviv-based Połoniecki publishing house. The novel is bound in a period binding, complete, with tight, intact stitching.
The block is compact, tight, and mechanically stable; the original stitching is intact, the folds are even, and the volume is bibliographically complete; the aforementioned perforations do not compromise the integrity of the pages or the legibility of the text. The paper has adequate stiffness, with numerous natural foxing spots, acid discoloration, and soiling on the margins from long-term handling. The original period half-leather binding is in good condition — the leather spine is clean and firm, with no cracks at the seams; the blind-stamped title is deep and legible; the cardboard endpapers show natural edge wear.
Catalog ID: 11389-20-A-W
Title: Anarchists.
Author: Wiesław Sclavus [Wacław Gąsiorowski (1869–1939)—novelist, journalist, and columnist; independence activist and member of the Polish diaspora; the pseudonym “Wiesław Sclavus” revealed on the title page].
Publisher: Lviv, Księgarnia Polska B. Połoniecki.
Year of publication: 1906.
Format: 20 cm.
Volume: [2], 304 pp.
Binding: original period half-leather.
The novel was published in Lviv in 1906, during the 1905–1907 revolution in the Russian partition, by Bernard Połoniecki’s Księgarnia Polska. The author’s pen name appears on the title page. Under this pseudonym, Gąsiorowski also published *Ugodowcy* (1901), *Królobójcy* (1905), and *Finis Poloniae* (1906). Bernard Połoniecki (1861–1943) ran Księgarnia Polska from 1889 onward and developed it into a large enterprise with a modern printing press and bookbinding workshop. The company published the largest number of Young Poland poetry collections in Lviv, including works by Leopold Staff, Jan Kasprowicz, and Kornel Makuszyński.
Wacław Gąsiorowski, born Jan Wacław (1869–1939), was born in Warsaw and died in Konstancin. Orphaned at an early age, he began working to earn a living at the age of 15 and acquired his knowledge on his own. He worked as a pharmacist’s assistant—an experience he described in his novel *Pigularz* (1900)—and served for just under two years in the Tsarist army. In 1900, he published and edited the magazine *Strumień*. After publishing the anti-tsarist work *Ugodowcy*, printed under the pseudonym Wiesław Sclavus, his identity was exposed by the Russian Okhrana. He fled the Kingdom and spent three years in Lviv; from 1904 onward, he lived in Paris. He wrote historical novels centered on the Napoleonic epic and the November Uprising, including *Huragan*, *The Black General*, and *The Guard Light Cavalry*, as well as novels on contemporary themes. From 1921 to 1930, he resided in the United States, and in 1938 he received the Eliza Orzeszkowa Award for his life’s work.
Provenance: no old institutional stamps or ownership markings. The only trace of previous circulation is small, clean holes in the paper running through the folds to the middle of the block.
An item for collectors of 19th- and 20th-century prose, admirers of Gąsiorowski’s work, and collectors of prints from the Lviv-based Połoniecki publishing house. The novel is bound in a period binding, complete, with tight, intact stitching.
The block is compact, tight, and mechanically stable; the original stitching is intact, the folds are even, and the volume is bibliographically complete; the aforementioned perforations do not compromise the integrity of the pages or the legibility of the text. The paper has adequate stiffness, with numerous natural foxing spots, acid discoloration, and soiling on the margins from long-term handling. The original period half-leather binding is in good condition — the leather spine is clean and firm, with no cracks at the seams; the blind-stamped title is deep and legible; the cardboard endpapers show natural edge wear.
Catalog ID: 11389-20-A-W
