The Education, Linguistics, European and Comparative Literature and Language Studies Library hosts the presentation of "Jozef Ignác Bajza - René, or: A Young Man's Adventures and Experiences. A translation with commentary of the first Slovak novel" with co-editor Dobrota Pucherová.
Programme
Welcome
Verena Kertelics
Deputy Librarian, Education, Linguistics, European and Comparative Literature and Language Studies Library
Book presentation
Dobrota Pucherová
Private Lecturer at the Department of European and Comparative Literature and Language Studies
Senior Researcher at the Institute of World Literature, Slovak Academy of Sciences
Moderation
Norbert Bachleitner
Professor at the Department of Comparative Literature
Afterwards, we invite you to a glass of wine.
About the book
This volume marks the first translation into another language of the first Slovak novel, René, or: A Young Man's Adventures and Experiences, published in Pressburg in 1783-1785. It was translated by David Short, a prize-winning translator from Czech and Slovak.
Written at a time when the Slovaks lived under the double domination of the Hungarian Kingdom and the Habsburg Monarchy, and their language was not yet codified, this Bildungsroman promotes the idea of the Slovak people as a modern European nation. Its familiar landscape, echoing Voltaire, Montesquieu, Wieland or Johnson, place it among the classics of the Age of Enlightenment. At the same time, the book documents the particular challenges faced of an Enlightenment intellectual writing in a minor language.
Jozef Ignác Bajza (1755-1836) was born in Upper Hungary and studied at Collegium Pazmanianum in Vienna. After being ordained as a priest in St. Stephen's Cathedral in 1780, he returned to Upper Hungary, where he would remain for the rest of his life, serving as a chaplain, a parish priest and a canon.
His protagonist René and his companion are curious anthropologists studying the cultures of various societies. Their interrogation of social custom, class system, religious practice and ecclesiastical authority reflects Bajza's belief in the power of critical examination to better the world. Their journeys from Venice to the Middle East, Austria and Upper Hungary measure the distance between "civilization" and "barbarity" and allow the author to deliver stinging criticism of his own society.
About the authors
The book was co-authored by Anikó Dušíková (left) from the Dept. of Hungarian Language and Literature at Comenius University; Dobrota Pucherová (centre) and Erika Brtáňová (right) from the Institute of Slovak Literature, Slovak Academy of Sciences.
