Slovenska Literatura (May 2011)
The motifs of national exodus in Ján Kollár’s works
Abstract
The motifs of national exodus in Ján Kollár´s works Róbert K i s s S z e m á n, University Lóranda Eötvösa, Budapest, Hungary The study tries to grasp a phenomenon of the early 19th century when the Slovak nation and national literature separated from the Hungarian cultural tradition. However, many of its traditional features continued to exist in modern national literatures. The author focuses on the phenomenon of exodus as one of the defining organizational factors of Kollár´s life. He tries to reconstruct Kollár´s relationship with the world in his childhood and youth from individual chapters of his memoirs Paměti z mladších let života (Momoirs of my life´s younger years), she mentions his priesthood in Pešť, whose most important moment was Slovak church´s independence struggle against the German majority. The parts dealing with Kollár´s Čítanka demonstrate the impact of exodus on his personal life and priest´s and teacher´s careers. The concept of Panslavism in his works is interpreted as an imaginary home, which refers to Old Testament´s paradigm system of Promised land. There is some symbolism in Kollár´s travels around Italy, which played an important role in Slovak national exodus. This phenomenon is naturally associated with many sonnets in Slávy dcéra (Fame´s daughter), which by activating the Old Testament´s symbolism in a creative way also played a major role in establishing new Czech and Slovak ethnographies.
