Chapter I: Preface

Although the Czecho-Slovaks have a great literature, particularly rich in poetry, but very little has been introduced to the American public. This has perhaps been due mainly to the fact that the Czechs did not possess their independence and consequently were considered an insignificant nation submerged within the shadows of the former Austro-Hungarian empire. Since the World War has resulted in liberating oppressed nationalities, and Czecho-Slovakia has again regained her ancient independence, undoubtedly a greater opportunity will be offered to learn more about the language and literature of that liberty loving people.

As is usually the case with a nation held in subjugation, so with the Czecho-Slovaks, their poets kept alive the national spirit until their liberation. The purpose of this little volume is not only to present a few specimens of Czecho-Slovak poetry, but also to show how Czecho-Slovak poets kept the “fires of Liberty” burning, while awaiting “dawn’s redemptory glow.” For, in the words of Jablonský,--

“Ask thou what’s more beautiful,--
Hither lay thy right hand:
’Tis the heart, beloved son,
Beating for native land.”

Of the poets herein represented, Jan Kollár, the Slovak poet, is known as the poet of Pan-Slavism. Vítězslav Hálek was the forerunner of the modern school of poets, instilling idealism and enthusiasm into the then newly resurrected national life. Svatopluk Čech has the distinction of being the most popular of all the Czech poets. Petr Bezruč, “first bard of Bezkyd, and the last,” is the Mountain Poet of (Lower) Silesia. Blowing into a “dying flame,” he has kept alive the Czech national spirit of that region against the combined efforts of the Germans and the Poles. J. S. Machar is the leading poet of Czecho-Slovakia in the present day.

CONTENTS

JAN KOLLÁR PAGE

THE DAUGHTER OF SLÁVA 7

VÍTĚZSLAV HÁLEK

EVENING SONGS 9

SVATOPLUK ČECH

SONGS OF THE SLAVE 12

PETR BEZRUČ

ONE MELODY 27

SILESIAN FORESTS 28

A RED BLOSSOM 29

YOU AND I 30

70,000 31

J. S. MACHAR

ON GOLGOTHA 32

A FANTASTIC BALLAD 38

A SONNET OF THE PAST 40

A SONNET OF LIFE 41

TO MY MOTHER 42

THE SPIRAL, OR ON THE DECLINE OF A CENTURY 43

SONGS OF THE SLAV

THE DAUGHTER OF SLÁVA

JAN KOLLÁR

_Canto III. Sonnet 62_

A hundred times I spoke, but now I call
To you divided, O Slavonians!
Let’s be a whole and not a part in clans;
Be one in harmony or naught at all.

A dove-like nation we in scorn are styled.
But doves you know are come of such a stock
That loves to live within a common flock,
And so may you apply this trait reviled.

O Slavs, thou race of many fragments!
United forces e’er results will show,
But waste and dry the circling currents.

O Slavs, who are of many heads a race!
The wise indeed a death no worse can know
Than life that sloth, void, darkness doth embrace.

_Canto III. Sonnet 110_

What will become of Slavs in hundred years?
What will the whole of Europe come to be?
Slav life, just as a mighty flow appears,
Shall everywhere extend its boundary.

That tongue, which German henchmen falsely low
Proclaimed a tongue of slaves to all around,
Shall ’neath our rival’s palace ceilings sound
And even spoken be by lips of foe.

Sciences shall likewise Slav channels see;
Our people’s customs, dress and music will
On both the Seine and Danube modish be.

O would that I had rather been born when
The Slavs shall rulers be! Or better still,
I shall then rise up from my grave again.

EVENING SONGS

VÍTĚZSLAV HÁLEK

I

“Unmeet it is for man to lack
In song,” once God in judgment spake,
Created man a poet then,
And bade him this allotment take:

“So long as thou liv’st know no peace,
But only learn of pain instead;
And disappointed too in hope,
In tears eat thou thy daily bread.

“Torn be thy heart and bled from wounds,
But thyself only see thy bleeding;
Though hounded over every bound,
Love thou but all the more and sing.”

It is us singers’ common lot,
The world may only know our songs,
To know what prompted us to sing,
To none within this world belongs.

II

O Lord, of every claim to gift
I have, my soul here now I free;
But leave to me the gift of song,
That only do I beg of thee.

If thou shouldst take my gift to sing,
Naught longer then is life to me;
And gav’st me Fortune for my song,
I care not fortunate to be.

III

Whoever plays with golden strings,
Him honor more than thyself even;
For know that God did love thee so,
He needs must send him thee from heaven.

’Tis terrible when plague and want
To God’s chastisement must belong;
Of punishments the greatest though,
Is when a nation lacks in song.

That race indeed has yet to die,
That had its prophets still to sing;
And every song that’s born in heaven
In even death new life doth bring.