Choroby przemysłowe w medycynie, ruchu socjalistycznym i wybranych powieściach przemysłowych ostatniej dekady XIX wieku

The article discusses the problem of industrial diseases as represented in medicine, socialist discourse, and literature of the final decades of the nineteenth century. The development of industry during this period was accompanied by the great hopes of positivists who promoted the cult of work. However, employment in modern branches of industry that began to emerge or expand in the Russian partition turned out to be not only an opportunity for the surplus population of the agrarian society but also a new threat – both social and health-related. Industrial diseases thus became a major challenge for the discourse of hygiene, which was focused on improving the living conditions of the population. The issue of industrial diseases was also addressed by the illegal socialist press. Numerous articles emphasized the harmfulness of work in various branches of industry. The problem also appeared in literary texts – primarily in the works of Stefan Żeromski and Artur Gruszecki. The article traces the circulation of images and ideas concerning industrial diseases among medical, political, and literary discourses, highlighting the transfer of identical motifs and even fragments of texts from one discourse to another.