Historical and Literary Society

The Historical and Literary Society – Société Historique et Littéraire Polonaise
Formation1832
TypePolitical and literary club with library
Location
  • 6, Quai d'Orléans, Ile Saint-Louis, Paris
Membership
400
President
C. Pierre Zaleski
Chairman of Trustees
C. Pierre Zaleski
Co-librarian
W. Zahorski
Websitewww.bibliotheque-polonaise-paris-shlp.fr

The Historical and Literary Society, (Polish: Towarzystwo Historyczno-literackie, French: Société historique et littéraire polonaise – SHLP) a successor organisation to the Literary Society, was founded in Paris in 1832 as a Polish political and cultural association by a group that included Alexandre Walewski, Napoleon's natural son and future minister of foreign affairs of Napoleon III. Its founding chairman was Adam Jerzy Czartoryski and from 1861, his son, Wladyslaw Czartoryski. The society's original aim was "to collect and publicise materials relating to the former Kingdom of Poland, its current circumstances and future prospects, in the context of maintaining and encouraging in the opinion of nations the sympathy they have directed towards Poland.[1]

It found not only sympathy but support and practical assistance in the higher échelons of French society. It is co-owner of the Polish Library in Paris.

Czartoryski (seated) and sons. Standing to his right is Władysław Czartoryski.
  1. ^ (in Polish: zbierać i ogłaszać materiały tyczące się dawnego Królestwa Polskiego, jego obecnego położenia lub pomyślności przyszłej, a to w widoku zachowania i ożywiania w opinii narodów spółczucia, które dla Polski okazywały). See: Mazanek, Anna. 'Towarzystwo Historyczno-Literackie', in: Literatura Polska, przewodnik encyklopedyczny, Warsaw 1985, v. II, p. 482.