Page 238 - Ciancia, On Civilization's Edge

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much of it linked to narratives of Poland’s deep national heritage. In each instance, articles
mounted the case for imagining the province as a coherent cultural and historical unit within the

broader Polish state for a primarily Volhynian reader.

Individual guidebooks to the province’s towns also bore the traces of internal Volhynian

conversations, with urban elites using the opportunity to showcase the civilizational superiority of

their towns, often in direct competition with counterparts across the province. In 1932, a sightseeing

society at the famous lyceum in Krzemieniec published a guide to the town and the surrounding

region that aimed to provide information and suggest routes for visitors. But the book also served as

a forum for boasting of the town’s credentials. While its authors lamented the fact the town’s sanitary

state “left a lot to be desired,” they also celebrated Krzemieniec’s cultural position as the so-called

Volhynian Athens and argued that, in comparison with other Volhynian towns, Krzemieniec actually

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fared rather well. Similarly, Równe’s municipal authorities used their 1937 guide as a platform

from which to enumerate the many improvements that they had made in the areas of sanitation,

municipal facilities, and cultural work since the dawn of Polish independence and to claim that they

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had overseen nothing less than “a gradual renaissance” in Volhynia’s largest town. In an attempt to

balance a narrative about Równe’s premodern past with gestures toward its modernizing present, the

guide featured a walking tour that directed people around the town, highlighted significant sites, and

bypassed areas that were deemed to be of little interest. Emphasizing the national history of

Równe—a town that its critics in Łuck depicted as inadequately Polish—the book urged people not

only to go and see the castle and the town’s numerous churches but also to take note of new

additions, such as the municipal park, the sports field, and an area of the town in which the streets

were clean, wide, and featured modern conveniences. The encroachment of modernity, the guide

97 “Regjon Wołyński–kraina wielkich możliwości turystycznych,” Wołyń, June 14, 1936, 6.
98 Mały ilustrowany przewodnik po Krzemieńcu i okolicy (Krzemieniec, 1932), 20.
99 Ilustrowany przewodnik po mieście Równem (Równe, 1937), 8.

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