Poetry since 1945

Only a few years later another young, talented poet Daniel Hevier entered literature. After the first virtuoso books indicating his extraordinary sense of language, he came up with the collections Nonstop (1981) andElektrónkový klaun (‘Electronic Clown’, 1983). He managed to create an alternative to civilism which in his case was derived from common situations of man living in the ‘grey’ years of communism. He put up a mocking mirror and his refusal culminated in a clownish decadent attitude.
From the mid 1970s Anna Ondrejková also made an appearance in Slovak poetry, attempting to find elements shared by folklore, social sentiment (Kým trvá pieseň, ‘As Long As the Song Lasts’, 1975) and a deep personal message (Snežná nevesta, ‘The Snow Bride’, 1978, and Plánka, ‘Wild Tree’, 1984). In comparison to Hevier her poetry was more moderate and traditional, however in the last two books her verse depicted a sense of rootlessness, schizoid disorder and lack of experience. The conservative expression of Ondrejková was in line with the poetry of Ján Zambor, an author who revived the basic modernist gestures of symbolism in a most remarkable way, (the collections Zelený večer, ‘The Green Evening’, 1977, and Neodkladné, ‘Urgent’, 1980). By using minimalist forms, his gesture is enriched with powerful analytical fragments.
A quality increase in poetry can be observed in the latter part of the 1970s and at the beginning of 1980s when gradually talented poets of preceding decades were able to return. Apart from the older authors (V Turčány), these comprised mainly of a strong generation of poets from the 1960s. New books of verse were released by concretist authors J Stacho and J Mihalkovič, and new trends were presented by Ľ Feldek in his collectionPoznámky na epos (‘Notes on the Epos’, 1980), a set (in topic and form) of different poems reacting to daily inspirations, and also deepening the relationship of private vs historical and intiminate vs public.
After a period of silence new books were published almost simultaneously by Mikuláš Kováč, Ivan Štrpka, Štefan Moravčík and Ján Štrasser. M Kováč published the books Zemnica (‘The Earth House’) and Písanie do snehu (‘Writing In the Snow’), both in 1978, and Rodinná pošta (‘The Family Mail’, 1980), in which we can see the poet indignant at the tragic situation of a simple person swallowed by the blind mechanism of history. New impulse can be found in the books of verse by Ivan Štrpka, Teraz a iné ostrovy (‘Now and Other Islands’, 1981), Pred premenou (‘efore the Metamorphosis’, 1982) and Správy z jablka (‘News From the Apple’, 1985). Usage of shortcut and parallel worlds is intertwined with a complex, multi-level consciousness of the lyrical subject facing humdrum as well as peak moments of an individiual. The meticuously-carved word is characteristic of Š Moravčík and his verse (Čerešňový hlad, ‘The Cherry Hunger’, 1979), an ecstatic enchantment with eroticism, life and death, all necessarily linked in a natural circle. In his subsequent books which also include some texts from the first stage of his writing, he experiments with how far he can go with word play and the boundless freedom of poetic writing and life. In his poems of this time we can also find awareness of the existence of the reverse side presented by the limits to human chances as well as political reality (Erosnička, ‘The Erotic Frog’, Tichá domácnosť, ‘The Silent Household’, both 1981, Maľované jarmá, ‘The Painted Yokes’, 1984). J Štrasser, after his debut Odriekanie (‘Self-Denial’, 1968), released much later his further collections Podmet (‘Subject’, 1980) and Denne (‘Daily’, 1981), in which he offered analysis of the human existence in typical conditions of daily humdrum life. Both Moravčík and Štrasser are linked through their sense of satire, which they richly used in their books of the latter part of 1980s. One of the experienced poets who resumed publishing poetry in the 1980s was Kamil Peteraj. Compared with other authors Peteraj set his writing in concrete situations and in reality. Even though often based on his own personal experience, Peteraj’s poetry is able to create a precious image of a joint experience, often strictly dialectical or paradoxical (especially the books Minútové básne, ‘One Minute Poems’, 1986, and Útechy/maximy/telegramy, ‘Consolations-Maxims-Telegrams’, 1987).
#5 Apart from the famous names, some high quality poetic debuts were also made in the 1980s. The beginning of the decade saw the debuts of two women poets, Mila Haugová (Hrdzavá hlina, ‘Rusty Clay’, 1980, Premenlivý povrch, ‘Transforming Surface’, 1983) and Dana Podracká (Mesačná milenka, ‘The Moon Lover’, 1981, Zimní hostia, ‘The Winter Guests’, 1984). Whereas the poetry by Haugová was directed towards an intimate utterance based on precise introspection and its symbolical natural expression, Podracká added more literary knowledge, intertextual coherence and intellectual coverage of motives.
A more turbulent response was evoked by Jozef Urban, Ivan Kolenič and Taťjana Lehenová, young poets entering the literature in the mid 1980s. Their radical poetry of revolt provoked a negative response from literary scholars and attracted various accusations of public unsuitability, eg Lehenová was accused of pornography for her playful erotic poems. Urban’s book of verse Malý zúrivý Robinzon (‘The Small Ferrocious Robinson’, 1985) reacted in a polemic way to current social and poetic convention and through a youthful revolt to intimate and challenging situations he provoked the reader to overcome hypocritical blindness. Urban’s poetry rose above other poetic writings through its extraordinary language skills and showy way of eased verse intertwined with elements of bound verse.
A gesture of revolt also marked Ivan Kolenič’s poetic debut Prinesené búrkou (‘Brought By the Storm’, 1986) in which he accentuates on one hand a strong sense of freedom and exuberance, and on the other great sensitivity and sentiment. Further books by Kolenič always brought a distinct change of poetics as well as overall concept. Even though all three authors entered literature in a rather remarkable way, their potential for innovation stagnated in following decade and other poets had a more inspiring impact.
The political changes of November 1989 brought final liberation from political diktat in the field of art. The launch of parliamentary democracy created sufficient conditions for all authors without any exceptions. However, the new circumstances brought new restrictions of a different character – economic. Mass support for literature, a broad network of libraries and low book prices ceased to be automatic and soon economic criteria became an unwanted but decisive phenomenon in the field of publishing. Another tendency which has had a negative impact on poetry was the growth of media competition, which shifted the book ‘medium’ to the edge of general interest, as a result of which literature was ‘marginalised’ (P Zajac) and above all poetry became a minority literary genre. The importance of literature in the years of the communist oppression (as well as in preceding centuries when the Slovaks had formed as an independent nation) was greater, because it played the role of a broad social tribune, and often as a counterbalance to official political thought.