K variantnosti Hlučné samoty
The variability of Too Loud a Solitude

Summary/Abstract: This article deals with the special variability of Příliš hlučná samota (Too Loud a Solitude), particularly its second version, over which the specialist literature predominantly expresses misgivings (often designating it as less Hrabalesque). By analysing individual passages in substantial detail I endeavour to show the specific nature of each version and how these versions (particularly the second) differ from the others. I have chosen the legitimizing narrative mode, which Hrabal is probably caricaturing, as a summarizing description of the specific nature of the second version. This finding is indicated by the emphasis on semantic concretization (which is not typical of Hrabal), which is subverted by the narrator’s uncertainty and his attempt to depict in greater detail not only real scenes, but also Haňťa’s interior life, with the emphasis on a more detailed depiction of the onset of normalization. In the second version Haňťa is sentimental, lacking a sense of humour and self-irony. He puts the misery of the world down to the account of the inhuman heavens. I illustrate this characteristic in Haňťa’s dual attitude towards the scatological anecdote (the carnival merriment of the first and third version as against the metaphysics of shit in the second version), not least in Haňťa’s idea of an enormous press that he would use to compress Germany.

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