For Everyone His Own Verhaeren: Czech Reception of Belgian Modernist Literature as an Example of Cultural Transfer and a Path to the Czech Avant‑Garde (1880s–1920s)
For Everyone His Own Verhaeren: Czech Reception of Belgian Modernist Literature as an Example of Cultural Transfer and a Path to the Czech Avant‑Garde (1880s–1920s)

Summary/Abstract: Translating and interpreting the work of the Belgian francophone poet Émile Verhaerenin Bohemia between 1880s–1920s was a way of being Czech, Francophile, modern, andcertainly not German – not always in the same order or with the same understanding ofwhat ‘modern’ means. The study analyzes Czech reception of Émile Verhaeren (1855–1916),in critical discussion with the German (Austrian) appropriation and in the context ofdebates on modern art. Jaroslav Vrchlický needs to be given credit for introducing to hisCzech aesthetic adversaries of the 1890s their Belgian symbolist models. The trajectorythat leads Verhaeren, a “Rubens in words” of Vrchlický’s 1888 interpretation, to Šalda’s recognised representative of Belgian symbolism of the 1910s and the proto -communistcollective author of Neumann’s and Hilar’s appropriation of 1920s guides us through thecomplex development of Czech modernist art from early modernism of the 1880s to itsavant -garde peak in the 1920s. Verhaeren served as a catalyzer and a guiding figure forthe Czech artists, who helped to steer them, through complex meanders, towards themodernity of the 20th century

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