Informace o publikaci
The Beat Generation in Communist Czechoslovakia: the Editorial Paratexts and the Construction of the Author
| Název česky | Beat Generation v komunistickém Československu: redakční paratexty a konstrukce Autora |
|---|---|
| Autoři | |
| Rok publikování | 2018 |
| Druh | Konferenční abstrakty |
| Fakulta / Pracoviště MU | |
| Citace | |
| Přiložené soubory | |
| Popis | After the controversy surrounding Josef Škvorecký’s novel The Cowards in the late 1950s, the official ideologues in communist Czechoslovakia increased their stranglehold on literature. As a result, publishing Western and especially American literature, already a challenging and politicized task, had been constrained even further. Therefore, publishers had to carefully package their releases in order to appease the censors. The most common means of such textual reconstruction were cautiously written book covers and especially editorial prefaces or afterwords. This was also the case with the publication of several Beat Generation texts during the period. Publisher’s paratexts, such as the afterwords of the editor Jan Zábrana, usually contrasted the author’s life in relation to the values of socialist Czechoslovakia. By highlighting not only the Beats’ dissatisfaction with American consumerism but also their inability to reach the “correct” ideological stance, these paratexts managed to portray the Beats as nonconformist, yet still ideologically acceptable writers, and therefore fit for publication. Sharply contrasting with the often sensationalist portrayal of the Beats in their home country, the textual strategies of Czechoslovak editors necessary for publication of the Beats thus reveal the publisher’s paratexts as texts able to reconstruct the author in a frequently contradictory manner. |