Today, the figure of Celina Mickiewicz does not arouse widespread interest. During her lifetime it was similar – in the foreground stood the bard of the Polish literary pantheon and her husband, Adam Mickiewicz. She was considered a wife in her husband’s shadow (flawed at that), at a certain point even as someone less than a wife. She lived in the shadow of mental illness. She died at a relatively young age, orphaning six children.
At the Altar
Celina Mickiewicz was born on July 16, 1812. She was the daughter of the famous pianist Maria Szymanowska. She was considered a capricious person, yet at the same time of beautiful appearance.
She most likely met her future husband during one of the poet’s visits to her mother. Adam Mickiewicz did not initially intend to marry Celina, but she once confessed her feelings for him. The poet decided to take her as his wife.
The young couple (though Mickiewicz was not so young anymore, being 35 years old) married on July 22, 1834, in Paris. During the first years of marriage, they formed a cohesive and successful couple, though Celina herself did not enjoy a good reputation among Mickiewicz’s acquaintances in emigration. They believed (including poet Zygmunt Krasiński) that she was extravagant and emotionally unstable.
The Beginnings of Mental Disorders
Adam Mickiewicz’s wife was certainly a person of delicate psychological constitution. Already in childhood, she experienced depression. The question of genes also came into play – cases of mentally ill persons occurred in her family.
People were probably surprised to see Celina repeatedly walking down the street in men’s clothing. Her behavior, especially after the birth of her second child, became strange and showed signs of mental illness.
The famous writer’s wife frequently erupted in anger and aggression, sometimes not knowing what was happening around her. This behavior was explained in various ways. Some publicists even claimed that it resulted from… not having sex with her husband! At present, such an explanation can be considered inadequate at the very least.
An Increasingly Deteriorating Mental State
Year by year, Celina Mickiewicz fell into an increasingly worse mental state. Sometimes it seemed to her that she was the Virgin Mary and was being called to save the entire world. Such episodes of illness negatively affected her relationship with her husband.
As if that weren’t enough, the Mickiewicz family began to struggle with increasingly serious-looking financial troubles. As a result, the writer began looking for permanent employment. Until then, he had not had any.
One day he realized that he could no longer care for his wife by himself and sent her to an asylum for the insane in Vanves, near Paris. Celina had a hard time enduring the difficult conditions prevailing in that place. She sent her husband letters with fervent pleas to take her away from there as soon as possible. In Vanves, the „treatment” consisted of denying patients sleep, isolating them, and frightening them. No wonder the woman was afraid to stay there. After a few months, however, she left the institution and returned home, already in better health.
Between France and Switzerland
After Celina’s return, she and the whole family moved to Switzerland. There, Adam Mickiewicz became a lecturer at a university. The Mickiewicz family rented an elegant house with a view of Lake Geneva.
However, family happiness did not last long. Celina fell ill again, which may have been caused by an increasing sense of loneliness due to Mickiewicz’s habitual absence from home, forced to work hard. As a result, the married couple with children then moved back to Paris. In 1838, the Mickiewicz couple’s first son was born (two daughters had come first – Maria and Helena). Adam received a position at the Collège de France in Paris.
In the spring of 1841, Celina’s health deteriorated again. This time the illness attacked forcefully and unexpectedly. The motif of greatness and being chosen to fulfill a special mission appeared again. Little is known about this period in the life of the future bard’s wife. However, information has survived about Celina being confined to Vanves again.
In a Hellish Triangle: The Mickiewicz Couple and „Prophet” Andrzej Towiański
Shortly after sending Celina to the asylum for the insane, Andrzej Towiański appeared at the Mickiewicz home, a Lithuanian of noble origin. He was the same age as Adam Mickiewicz. In 1828, this man claimed to have had a vision in a Bernardine church in Vilnius. Somewhat later in the sky – as he himself claimed – the Virgin Mary also appeared to him, pointing to France as the goal of his future missionary activity.
Towiański was perfectly aware that his mission would collapse like a house of cards if he failed to establish cooperation with a person who had authority among people. And such a person was undoubtedly Adam Mickiewicz. An interesting fact is that the self-proclaimed prophet brought about the healing (at least to some degree) of Celina through his actions, which lifted her husband’s spirits. From that time on, Mickiewicz came under the influence of the ambitious prophet, executing almost reflexively his successive orders.
In 1842, both men created the „Circle of God’s Cause.” This organization counted more and more members each month. To outsiders, it seemed that the recruiters were insane. The French authorities took a closer interest in the Circle’s creators and expelled Towiański from the country, considering him a Russian agent.
The Ksawera Deybel Affair
Women also participated actively within the Circle. One of them was a certain Ksawera Deybel. She was born in 1818 in Vilnius. She was a governess in the Mickiewicz household and lived with them for about 10 years. At a certain point, she became the bard’s mistress.
It turned out that the romance was serious. Ksawera was said to have borne the poet one or two children. The fact of sleeping alternately with both women under one roof meant that the Mickiewicz family bore features of pathology, though some thought differently at the time.
Deybel herself was not particularly beautiful, but she reportedly had an „extraordinary gaze” from which her lover could not tear his eyes away. Her relationship with Mickiewicz was favored by the master of the „Circle of God’s Cause” himself, Towiański. He claimed that his compatriot had the right to sleep with his mistress, which constituted for him a kind of reward for the effort he had put into developing the organization thus far. Celina was very hurt by her husband’s infidelity, but blinded by the master’s teaching, she did not intend to oppose his opinion.
Ksawera Deybel often openly manifested her bond with Adam, which greatly humiliated Celina. The poet’s mistress had a high position in the „Circle,” so the bard’s lawful wife had to settle for a secondary place at best. The situation that had developed did not satisfy her, and she wanted things to be as they were before.
After some time, a split occurred in the „Circle.” Mickiewicz along with Ksawera headed one of the factions. In 1847, Mickiewicz established closer contact with a journalist and writer of American origin, Margaret Fuller. Apparently, in addition to a romance, they were also bound by love (however one understands that word in this context), which the poet was said to have confessed to the woman. However, this relationship ended quite quickly and suddenly, due to Margaret’s interest in another man.
These affairs of her own husband must have pained Celina greatly. After all, she was the mother of his children and a faithful companion in life. Perhaps the involvement in the „Circle” affair and Celina’s previous mental problems caused Mickiewicz’s feelings for his wife to diminish practically to zero.
The End of Celina’s Life
Toward the end of her life, Celina Mickiewicz fell ill with cancer. For this reason, she lay in bed all the time. Her husband Adam and their eldest daughter cared for the sick woman. At this time, Ksawera Deybel was no longer in the Mickiewicz household, having disappeared from there for reasons unknown no later than 1853.
It turned out that Mickiewicz could be a caring and devoted husband in the face of his wife’s terminal illness. He would later speak of dying Celina’s courage.
Celina spent her last Christmas before her death at home, in her own bed, increasingly ravaged by the disease. At her request, Mickiewicz revealed to his wife in early March 1855 that she had a few days of life remaining. Thanks to this, Celina could prepare for the arrival of death. She gave away all her belongings and summoned a priest.
Her last wish was for her husband to marry Celina’s sister, Zofia, after her death. However, this did not happen. It was prevented by Mickiewicz’s death during a cholera epidemic in Constantinople in November 1855.
Selected Bibliography
- Koneczny F., Życie i zasługi Adama Mickiewicza, Komorów 2009.
- Koper S., Kobiety w życiu Mickiewicza, Warszawa 2010.
- Sudolski Z., Panny Szymanowskie i ich losy, Warszawa 1986.
- Witkowska A., Celina i Adam Mickiewiczowie, Kraków 1998.
