Slovenska Literatura (Apr 2005)
A Journey to „a Magic of Unwanted“ (Peter Pišťanek: Young Dônč)
Abstract
The study reflects one of the representative works of Slovak literary situation at the turn of 80th and 90th of the 20th c. The analysis and interpretation of the prose collection Mladý Dônč (Young Dônč) confirms that a new generation of thirty-years old authors is coming on the scene (Taragel, Pišťanek, Otčenáš) with their creative gesture which means a destruction of important levels of Slovak literary tradition. In the case of Pišťanek it is a parodic destructing of a traditional up-hill runner (idyllic, shepherded) archetype by cumulating of physical and mental deformations of the characters, then also a destruction of a canon about traditional travelling to find a work. He uses as an instrument recoding of a motive of such a wandering for expressing a sexual initiation and destruction of socialistically- Realistic picture of a city and a factory as a space of progress modelling their value “perverted” version. Using a motive of work with a village as a traditional theme in the Slovak literature, Peter Pišťanek belongs to the line of the authors such as J. C. Hronský, who introduces a tragic element into the shepherded idyll, or B. S. Timrava, whose village prose sounds in a strong satiric tone. Pišťanek uses a parody.
