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Jan Neruda (1834-1891) |
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Czech writer, poet, one of the most prominent representantives of Czech Realism. Jan Neruda's poetry collections were based on contemporary spoken language. He was a member of "the May school", which dominated Czech literature in the 1860s and 1870s, and which opened doors to the currents in European literature. This cosmo-political group took its name from the title of Karel Mácha's (1810-1836) lyrico-epic poem, Máj, published shortly before the poet's premature death. Its plot centers on the execution of an outlaw, a victim of his passions and alienation from society. The May school desired to break away from the narrow provincialism and nationalism of the preceding period, and emphasized general human themes. "It would be laughable for me to doubt that any of my readers should be unfamiliar with Malá Strana's foremost restaurant, that is, Steinitz's – the one in the first house past the Bridge Tower on the left, at the corner of Bridge and Bath streets, the house with the large windows and wide glass door – the only restaurant daring to occupy this most public of streets and opening directly on to the thoroughfare..." (in Prague Tales, 1878) Jan Nepomuk Neruda was born in Prague, Bohemia, and grew up in a colorful part of old Prague called Malá Strana (Little Quarter). Neruda's father was an ex-serviceman. After being widowed, he married Barbora Nerudová, Neruda's mother, who worked a housekeeper. "For having helped to defeat Napoleon at Leipzing and occupy France as far as Lyon (yes, really!)," Neruda later said, "he was granted the position of porter or supplier at various barracs". Eventually he started to run a small grocery shop in the Malá Strana; he died in 1857. Neruda maintained close ties with his mother, whose death in 1869 was a deep blow to him. Neruda was educated in Prague's German schools, but at the age
of thirteen he began attending lectures on the Czech language. He
studied law at his father's request for a period, then changed to
philosophy, but never graduated. Neruda worked as a teacher until 1860,
when he became a free-lance writer and journalist, contributing
influential essays to the major liberal Czech newspaper Národni listy.
There
were many women in Neruda's life, some of them were married, but Neruda
himself remained a bachelor, for which he was criticized by
conservative circles. Neruda's close friend was the writer Karolina Svetlá, married to a piano teacher, whom she did not love. Neruda's relationship with Anna Holinova, which he formed in his youth, lasted over 10 years. He had also an affair with Tereza Machackova, who died in 1865. Her sudden death was a shock to Neruda. However, Karolina was his love of life. With the writer and journalist Vitezslav Hálek (1835-1874), Neruda became the most prominent advocate of the new literary
trends. Like Hálek, he was associated with the journal Máj, first published in 1858. Neruda traveled widely in Europe and Near East, recording his
observations in numerous short sketches. Altogether Neruda published
2,260 feuilletons on various subjets. In his poems, hymns and ballads
Neruda promoted the idea of rebirth of Czech patriotism. He
participated in all the central cultural and political struggles of his
generation, and gained a reputation as a sensitive critic, followed the
rapid rise of Czech literature, theatre, and fine arts. Along with the new rise of national movement, anti-Semitism began to spread throughout the country. In his notorius pamphlet Pro strach židovský
(1870), Neruda stated that he was a friend of the Jews in his school years,
but they "are a nation entirely alien to us Czechs" and "[w]e
must view the Czech emancipation from the Jews above all as
emancipation from Jewish commerce, from the Jewish exploitation of the
labor of others. . . ." (The Jews of Bohemia and Moravia: A Historical Reader, ed. by Wilma Abeles Iggers, 1992, pp. 183-190) The views expressed in pamphlet, which was first published in the newspaper Národni listy, went far beyond the usual anti-Jewish discourse of the period. Neruda first entered the literary scene as a poet. As a short story writer his fame rests on his satirical depiction of the petty bourgeois of Prague. An exception among these pieces is 'Vampyr' (1871, The Vampire), a horror tale, in which vampirism is connected to artistic creation. A small group of travellers, sailing to Constantinople, is joined by a Greek artists, who sketches only corpses. A hotel-keeper tells the narrator: "That fellow paints them beforehand – and he never makes a mistake – just like a vulture." It turns out, to the horror of a mother, that the artist has just made a drawing of her daughter. It is possible that Kafka knew the story. Translated by Šárka B. Hrbková, 'The Vampire' was first published in English in Czechoslovak Stories (1920). Neruda's most popular prose work, Povídky malostranské (1878, Tales of the Little Quarter; Prague Tales), a collection of short stories, was translated into English first time in 1957 by the novelist and mystery writer Ellis Peters (pseudonym of Edith Pargeter). The tales take the reader to Malá Strana, to its streets and yards, shops, churches, houses, and restaurants. Neruda's rich gallery of people include Mr. Schlegl and Mr. Ryšánek, who cannot stand each other, Mr. Vojtišek, a beggar, who is ruined by rumors of his supposed two houses, a man who wakes up in his own funeral. Behind Neruda's laughter and descriptions of human follies are also tragic tones, as in Gogol's short stories. Death and funerals are often present in the stories – Neruda himself had surgery for a malignant tumor at the age of forty. Struggling to cope with his mother's death and growing feelings of isolation, Neruda's thoughts went often back to his childhood. In 'U trí lilií', the narrator – Neruda – sits outside a small pub. Graves in an old cemetery nearby have been opened. It is raining heavily and he sees in a flash of lighting white human bones. A beautiful girl dances inside the pub. She goes out in the rain, but returns after some fifteen minutes. She says she just heard that her mother died. The storm rages; the narrator walks with the girl under an arcade and he feels the touch of her soft body. "Cítil jsem, jak se mi k prsoum lepí vlhký její šat, cítil mekké telo, teplý, sálající dech – bylo mne, jako bych musil vypít tu zlotrilou duši z ní!" Neruda's poetry collections include Hřbitovní kvítí (1858), Knihy veršů (1867), Písně kosmické (1878), which was inspired by modern science, Prosté motivy (1883), an intimate diary, Balady a romance (1883), a collection of epic poems with political and social themes, and Zpěvy páteční (1896), published posthumously. After Neruda's death on August 22, 1891, one of the streets in Prague's Old Town, Nerudova ulice (Nerudagasse), was named after him. Neruda lived at 47 Nerudova. The Chilean poet Pablo Neruda, whose real name was Neftalí Ricardo Reyes Basoalto, took his pseudonym after Jan Neruda. For further reading: Nerudsa v dopisech by A. Prazák (1941); Jan Nruda a jeho doba by B. Stanislav (1953); Jan Neruda a jeho doba by Stanislav Budín Stanislav (1960); Neruda prozaik by A. Hamas (1968); Jan Neruda a konstituováni realismu v ceské literature by S.A Petrovna (1982); Jan Neruda - Bibliograficeskij ukazatel by Š.I. Aleksandrova and P. Pavel (1984); 'Introduction' by Ivan Klíma, in Praque Tales, tr. Michael Henry Heim (1993); La Calle Neruda by J. Kresadlo (1995); Tři stálice moderní české prózy: Neruda, Čapek, Kundera by Aleš Haman (2014); Čtení o Janu Nerudovi: utváření obrazu = Writings about Jan Neruda: the Creation of an Image, edited by Jakub Říha (2019). An Anthology of Czechoslovak Literature (tr. Paul Selver, 1929) contains translations from such writers as Otokar Brezina, Antonín Sova, J.S. Machar, Jan Neruda, K. Capek and others. Suomeksi: runokäännöksiä mm. teoksessa Slaavilaisen kirjallisuuden kultainen kirja (1936). Nerudan Prahalaistarinoita ilmestyi Taifuunin kustantamana vuonna 2000. Selected works:
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