Obraz Karla Klostermanna v české (literární) historiografii
Reflection of Karel Klostermann in Czech (literary) historiography

Summary/Abstract: The article deals with the problem of representation of an author Karel Klostermann (1848–1923) and his novels in Czech literary-historical handbooks, editorial prefaces, and encyclopedias. The article exposes the way in which Czech literary historiography works with the myth of Karel Klostermann as a documentarist of the ‘old Bohemian Forest’ (Šumava in Czech). An analysis of the above three distinct text types reveals that Klostermannʼs central topic — an unprecedented windstorm that had terminated the ‘original Bohemian Forest’ — is mostly seen not as a motive but as the fact (as well as in the recent discourse on Bohemian Forest National Park). However, the concepts of ‘monumental and naturally stable forest’ or ‘sudden epochal break’ were paradoxically known only from the novels of Karel Klostermann, who worked with them inconsistently. The article shows that Czech literary historiography does not deal with Klostermann’s fiction critically but rather replicates common stereotypes and dominant narrative about the past of the Bohemian Forest.

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