Strategie autentyczności w prozie Ignacego Karpowicza (Sońka i Miłość)

The article concerns two books by Ignacy Karpowicz – Sońka from 2014 and Miłość from 2017, interpreted in an autobiographical context. This context serves not so much to highlight the links between these novels and the writer’s experiences, but to recreate the “strategy of authenticity” used by Karpowicz in Sońka and the “strategy of honesty” used in Miłość. Both constitute a kind of “pact” (similar to the “autobiographical pact”) concluded with the readers by the author. According to Olga Szmidt’s deliberations, one of the inalienable elements of the “discourse of authenticity” is the undisclosed secret, which in Sońka’s case turns out to be the protagonist’s (homo) sexuality. The “strategy of honesty” is based on the assumption that the author does not hide anything from his audience. Both the interpretation of the two books contained in the text and the author’s brief discussion of their reception show that the “strategy of authenticity” seems to be more artistically effective.