'BRAVE NEW WORLD' - EUROPEAN INDUSTRIAL NOVELS 1855-1898 ('Nowy wspanialy swiat' - problematyka przemyslowa w europejskich powiesciach lat 1855-1898)

In this paper the authoress intends to show how the industrial revolution was brought upon a new world, which almost immediately was to become a literary myth. This idea is to be proved on the examples of Elizabeth Gaskell's 'North and South' (1855), Émile Zola's 'The Ladies' Delight' (1883), and Wladyslaw Reymont's 'The Promised Land' (1898). Moreover, we are of the opinion that in these three novels the realistic depiction of the machine society and the alienation it conveys is constantly balanced by an epic narrative, which builds up awe and admiration for it, especially for the 'men of industry' as heroes of a new conquest.