Sas 24 web indd

HOLT MEYER 61

(source of the mask image), the bourgeois novel of the 19

th

 century, the écriture blanche of 

the 20

th

 century (Camus, Blanchot) and Sartre’s conceptualization of littérature engagée. 

Hrabal’s writing of the early 80s has many implicit intertextual orientations. It names 

explicitly a number of names, and crucially refers the writing of Karel Marysko and Ro-

land Barthes as contemporaries (more specifically: as ‘Mr. Marysko’ and ‘Mr. Barthes’). 

Although it is an abridgement of the entire account which needs to be told, I am isolat-

ing the one case of Barthes in this network, and thus treating the (at least) quadruple 

network which Barthes brings into the mix only on the periphery of my argumentation.

It is in my view legitimate to account for this one transfer basically outside the 

intricate intertextual network in the Hrabal text, among other things due to the im-

plications it brings to bear on an assessment of Hrabal’s writing in a European (theo-

retical and literary) context, which in my view still needs to be worked through in 

many areas.

JANKOVIČ’S DISAPPEARING ACT: MISSING BARTHES

Všechno, o čem Eliška vypráví, je ovšem sebevýpovědí Hrabalovou […]. Trilogie nazývaná 

zkráceně Svatby v domě je vrcholným dílem Hrabalova ironického narcisismu. [Every-

thing about which Eliška tells is of course a statement of Hrabal about himself /…/. The 

trilogy called In-House Weddings is the pinnacle of Hrabal’s ironic narcissism] (Jankovič 

1991, p. 193, trans. H. M.).

7

The most elaborated account of the voice(s) narrating the trilogy was provided over 

twenty years ago, and it seems like this account created a consensus, since the posi-

tion has not been fundamentally critized. If so, I would like to break with that con-

sensus. I am, of course, speaking of Milan Jankovič’s Hrabal monograph, and also his 

articles on Hrabal, two of which are specifically on the trilogy and one of which con-

centrates solely on Proluky / Gaps.

As far as the nature of the voicing in the trilogy is concerned, a comment on Vita 

nuo va is revealing for Jankovič’s whole methodology:

At a closer look, we would find features of differentiation (be they psychological or lin-

guistic), but soon we discover that these differences are completely beside the point. The 

one speaking with us or the one conducting his conversation is a single narrator who in-

tegrates all those voices. The most contemporary and the most distant times are mixed 

and fused with each other, as if it were all one time. From this point of view it stops be-

ing important whether Eliška’s narration is fictional or not. Everything has in a certain 

sense created its own space and time, a space and time of the mixing of all of this […].

8

7

  None of Jankovič’s studies on Hrabal have been translated into English. The chapter Psaní 

proudem from his Hrabal monograph of 1996 was translated into French (Jankovič 2002). It is 

interesting to note that the title includes the term écriture (‘écriture de flux’), but that no at-

tempt was made to apply it to Barthes’s concept of écriture for the French edition of the study.

8

  ‘Při pozornějším pohledu bychom našli příznaky jejich rozlišení (jazykového nebo psycho-

logického), ale brzy zjistíme, že o takové rozlišení vůbec nejde. Promlouvá k nám či vede 

---

62 SLOVO A SMYSL 24

The statement that ‘features of differentiation’ are ‘completely beside the point’ (‘o ta-

kové rozlišení vůbec nejde’) is quite extreme. The concept of ‘a single narrator who 

integrates all those voices’ is from the point of view of narratology more than ques-

tionable. It is not clear what ‘integrate’ (integrovat) could mean, besides perhaps 

a Mukařovskian dynamic unity of meaning. But the idea of ‘integration’ seems to 

fall behind the complexity of Mukařovský’s concept of dynamism. Indeed, it seems 

to reduce everything to authorial intention, which is an odd move indeed for a struc-

turalist.

Jankovič’s general figure of thought is the ‘stream’ (proud), and it seems that it is 

applied not only to the syntagmatics of the text but rather also on the narratological 

level as well. For Jankovič there is ‘mixing and fusing’ on many levels. Taken to its 

logical extreme on the narratological level, the individual voices lose their identity 

and integrity altogether: ‘integration’ replaces integrity ‘completely’.

The analysis which I will be conducting presently calls this view into question, for 

it insists on the strict separation of voices as opposed to the one for all reading strategy 

suggested by Jankovič. Otherwise, as I would claim, the Barthes reference makes no 

sense. For it refers to the implementation of third person narrative and thus of the 

differentiation of a multiplicity of voices, even if this is a case of mere masking. The 

voice still needs to be posited before it is unmasked as a mask. Having said that, it is 

important to note that Jankovič’s approach brings other aspects to the fore which 

outweigh his programmatic narratological oversimplification.

Jankovič concentrates on the text as a whole, mainly with respect to its rhythm. 

Indeed, his interest goes beyond the Hrabal text and concerns general theoretical is-

sues which seem to be derived from the Mukařovský’s thinking, particularly as con-

cerns the nature of the aesthetic. Jankovič makes use of Hrabal’s ‘autobiographical 

trilogy’ in order to attempt nothing less than a diagnosis of Czech literature of this 

present time, or, to put in terms of Mukařovský’s approach: in order to describe the 

fate and state of the contemporary ‘aesthetic norm’, which is apparently viewed in the 

early 90s to include Hrabal’s prose of the early 80s. Jankovič is generally concerned 

with ‘cases in which traditional borders are erased or blurred: the border between 

fictional and autobiographical narration, between epic and lyric prose’ noting that 

this ‘creates a new focus on the border between prose and poetry as well’. Apparently 

referring to Mukařovský’s notions of the aesthetic, Jankovič states that ‘the question 

of artistry needs to be asked in each case anew, since the mixture which this litera-

ture represents is extremely changeable’.

Jankovič does not consider the theories of Roland Barthes, in contrast to those 

of Jan Mukařovský, to be relevant for ‘cases in which traditional borders are erased 

or blurred’, even though someone even vaguely familiar with Barthes’s work must 

know that ‘the border between fictional and autobiographical narration’ is of central 

concern for Barthes on many levels and that operations on that border and about that 

border can be found in any number of Barthes’s texts.

svůj hovor jediný vypravěč, který integruje všechny ty hlasy. Mísí a slévá se nejsoučasnější 

a velmi vzdálený čas vyprávěného, jako by to byl čas jeden. V této perspektivě přestává 

záležet i na tom, nakolik je Eliščino vyprávění fikcí. Vše jako by si vytvářelo svůj vlastní 

prostor a čas, prostor a čas smísení toho všeho […]’ (Jankovič 1991, p. 40).

---