Glorifikace autorského gesta
Glorification of the Geste ďAuter

Summary/Abstract: This article considers several aspects of the geste du narrateur in the works of Milan Kundera (b. 1929). With the geste du narrateur it is possible to unite and thematize texts of different genres (verse, drama, novels, and essays), and it is possible to read Kundera’s works as a definite voice, as a certain reflexion of speech. First, Kundera’s conception of poetic language is considered by looking at his analysis of poems by Vítězslav Nezval (1900–1958). Kundera considers anthropomorphic devices in particular, because the poems are, in his view, meant to transform the alienated world of phantoms into a world of objects that have a human dimension. An echo of the demiurge nature of the poetic word is audible in Kundera’s conception of the narrative, in his fundamental distinction between narrator and character. From this perspective it seems that the narrator occupies an invincible position of authority. Interpreting Kundera’s 1960 book on Vladislav Vančura (1891–1942) the article pays special attention to the concept of lyrical prose. It contrasts Kundera’s idea of fiction with the tradition of the nouveau roman (Robbe-Grillet) and New Criticism. It then characterizes Kundera’s style by the tension between his metaphorical and metonymous periods, and concludes that Kundera’s decision to set prose and the lyrical in opposition to each other is largely untenable, because his fictional world is in fact lyricized.

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