Slovanský romantismus: ani labuť, ani lůna
Slavic Romanticism: Neither Swan, nor Moon

Notes about Theoretical Modeling of Literary Movement

Summary/Abstract: This text is an attempt to revise the existing scientific consensus about the so-called Slavic Romanticism. At the same time it represents a conscious act of doubting its existence - not just as a generalizing concept, but also “partly”, with regards to a significant part of the “Romanticisms” in the various Slavic speaking lands in the 19th century. The main argument is that many of the essential features of Western European Romanticism stem directly from its very genesis – an artistic expression of the burgeoning bourgeois individualism. Lagging behind economically and being politically subordinated, the Slavic peoples formed instead an ethnocentrical, collectivist type of culture, generally incompatible with Romanticism. Nevertheless, Literary Studies disciplines in Slavic countries often tend to emphasize its local existence and to describe it by arbitrarily extending the meaning of the term to fit with local literary realities. It is only recently that we have in earnest observed radical critique of such an approach.

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