Zeyer’s Epicism and Lyricism
Zeyer’s Epicism and Lyricism

Summary/Abstract: This paper aims to explore the literary creations of the Czech poet Julius Zeyer (1841–1901) within the complexity of his poetic works, except dramas. The poet, prosaist, and dramatist Julius Zeyer ranks among the classic Czech authors active in the second half of the 19th century. Literary historians traditionally link him with the Lumír generation but he is often grouped also with the New Romantics contributing to periodicals Ruch, Lumír, and Květy, or, possibly, with the ‘sensitives’ of the 19th-century European culture. His works comprise texts of indisputable, time-honoured value, beside the texts on the verge of conventional fiction. Quantitatively, the literary production of Julius Zeyer comprises more than two thirds of epic works; almost two fifths are dramas; only a few of them are (purely) lyrical poems representing just a fraction of his comprehensive output. The proportions of the explored poetry and prose also feature two-third ratio in favour of prose against (in Zeyer, mostly epic) poetry.

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