Normalization in contemporary Czech prose: between nostalgia, ironizing, payback, and problematizing
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| Year of publication | 2024 |
| Type | Chapter of a book |
| MU Faculty or unit | |
| Citation | |
| Description | The text deals with various ways of depicting normalization in Czech post Communist literature. In the introductory passages, it considers the specifics of the treatment of historical facts in fiction, including the specifics that arise in comparison with other discourses. For this purpose, it defines terms such as past, history, contemporary history, (collective) memory, literature and others, using secondary historiographical literature. The ambiguous concept of normalization is also explained. To make the situation in this hitherto largely productive current clearer, we propose five specific modes—types within which normalization is presented in literature. Specifically, these are Mode 1: humorous, nostalgic, ironic; Mode 2: imaginative; Mode 3: payback, resistance; Mode 4: existential and Mode 5: problematizing. These modes are introduced in more detail with the help of about two-three examples, which illustrate the authors’ approaches, forms, and styles, as well as thematic diversity of Czech prose about normalization. |