Život, který se stal románem: Autofikční Životopisy Oty Filipa
A life that became a novel: The autofictional Autobiographies of Ota Filip

Summary/Abstract: The article examines the Czech author Ota Filip’s autofictional texts Sedmý životopis (The seventh autobiography, 2000) and Osmý čili nedokončený životopis (The eighth or unfinished autobiography, 2007) in the intersection of several contexts. Based on archival research of Filip’s estate, it reconstructs their complex genesis and examines the factors that influenced their final edition, as well as the differences between the Czech and German versions of Sedmý životopis. The study analyzes the narrative as well as broader textual and paratextual strategies that create the hybrid status of the two “autobiographies” and provide the reader with contradictory instructions: to read the texts as autobiography and/or as fiction. This tension is also investigated with regard to the reception of Filip’s texts. The study further exposes someof Filip’s mystifications and reveals how he uses the porous boundary between fact and fictionto come to terms with his traumas and media scandals, and to create a socially acceptable image of himself. Both autobiographies are also placed in the broader context of Filip’s literary works and contemporary Czech literature.

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