Antonín Sova (26 February 1864 – 16 August 1928) was a Czech
poet
A poet is a person who studies and creates poetry. Poets may describe themselves as such or be described as such by others. A poet may simply be the creator ( thinker, songwriter, writer, or author) who creates (composes) poems ( oral or wr ...
and the director of Prague Municipal Library.
Life
He was born in
Pacov, a small town in South Bohemia, then part of the
Austrian Empire
The Austrian Empire (german: link=no, Kaiserthum Oesterreich, modern spelling , ) was a Central- Eastern European multinational great power from 1804 to 1867, created by proclamation out of the realms of the Habsburgs. During its existence ...
, but from the age of two he grew up in nearby
Lukavec.
[Josef Zika: Cesta básníkova, životopisná poznámka in Pozdrav bouřlivé noci, Prague 1964, pp. 87–104 ] His father Jan was a
teacher
A teacher, also called a schoolteacher or formally an educator, is a person who helps students to acquire knowledge, competence, or virtue, via the practice of teaching.
''Informally'' the role of teacher may be taken on by anyone (e.g. w ...
and
choirmaster who occasionally composed.
[Čeští spisovatelé 19. a počátku 20. století, Prague 1982, pp. 241–245 ] His mother died when he was 15 and his father married again (Sova never had a positive relationship with his stepmother Sabina).
In Lukavec Antonín became acquainted with the sisters of
Jaroslav Vrchlický
Jaroslav Vrchlický (; 17 February 1853 – 9 September 1912) was a Czech lyrical poet. He was nominated for the Nobel prize in literature eight times.
Life
He was born Emilius Jakob Frida in Louny.
He lived ten years with his uncle, a ...
. He studied at the grammar school in
Pelhřimov,
Tábor
Tábor (; german: Tabor) is a town in the South Bohemian Region of the Czech Republic. It has about 33,000 inhabitants. The town centre is well preserved and is protected by law as an urban monument reservation.
Administrative parts
The followi ...
, and from 1881 to 1885 in
Písek
Písek (; german: Pisek) is a town in the South Bohemian Region of the Czech Republic. It has about 30,000 inhabitants. The town centre is well preserved and is protected by law as an urban monument zone.
Písek is colloquially called "''South ...
. He met the Písek-based poet
Adolf Heyduk
Adolf Heyduk (6 June 1835 – 6 February 1923) was a distinguished Czech poet and writer. Many of his poems were later set to music by Antonín Dvořák. The best known and most widely performed is the poignant and tender Songs My Mother Taught Me ...
who helped him publish his first poems in literary magazines (he used the pen-names Ilja Georgov and for
Lumír
''Lumír'' is a weekly literary magazine that was established in 1851 by Ferdinand Břetislav Mikovec. It was the focal point of the neo-romantic nationalist poet Jaroslav Vrchlický and his Ossianic followers.Arne Novák & William Edward Ha ...
Valburga Turková).
While at school he received the worst possible mark for morale because he ignored the interdict and wore a Czech tricolor tie in a park.
He started studying law in
Prague
Prague ( ; cs, Praha ; german: Prag, ; la, Praga) is the capital and largest city in the Czech Republic, and the historical capital of Bohemia. On the Vltava river, Prague is home to about 1.3 million people. The city has a temperate ...
but he did not finish for lack of money.
Jaroslav Vrchlický helped him find employment in
Otto's encyclopedia
''Otto's encyclopedia'' ( cs, Ottova encyklopedie or ), published at the turn of the 20th century, is the largest encyclopedia written in Czech. For its scope and the quality of the writing, it is comparable to the greatest world encyclopedias of ...
editorial department which lasted for only a year.
His next job was at the medical department of the Prague municipality. Eventually, from 1898 till he retired, he worked as a director of the Prague Municipal Library.
He married Marie Kovaříková, who was almost 20 years younger, in 1900, and had a son Jan with her a year later.
[Municipal Library of Písek: Antonín Sova ] Their marriage broke up after several years, though. The poet contracted a disease that paralysed him for the last two decades of his life (probably
syphilis).
After the constitution of Czechoslovakia in 1918 he lived in Prague and was often visited by younger poets of various styles and political inclinations.
In 1924 he moved "in his horsehair grave" to Pacov, where he died on a stormy August night in 1928.
The funeral took place in Prague but his ashes were taken to a granite stone in Pacov.
Early literary career
In 1897 Sova was among the writers who established the first Czech official literary association, called Máj.
His first published poetry collections were (Realistic strophes, 1890), (Flowers of Intimate Moods, 1891), (From My Country, 1893), (Compassion and Defiance, 1894), and (Broken Soul, 1895).
Sova was a supporter of the progressive national movement of the 1890s connected with the
Omladina Trial.
Together with 11 other writers he signed the manifesto called Česká moderna in 1895 to demand free speech, social reforms and individualism in art. The reflection of the manifesto in Sova's work is the collection (Uprisen Griefs, 1897).
Theodor Mommsen
In 1897
Theodor Mommsen
Christian Matthias Theodor Mommsen (; 30 November 1817 – 1 November 1903) was a German classics, classical scholar, historian, jurist, journalist, politician and archaeologist. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest classicists of the 19 ...
wrote a nationalist letter addressed to Germans in Austria (''An die Deutschen in Österreich'') and it was published in Vienna's ''Neue Freie Presse''.
Mommsen called
Czechs
The Czechs ( cs, Češi, ; singular Czech, masculine: ''Čech'' , singular feminine: ''Češka'' ), or the Czech people (), are a West Slavic ethnic group and a nation native to the Czech Republic in Central Europe, who share a common ancestry, ...
"apostles of barbarism" and wrote that "the Czech skull is impervious to reason, but it is susceptible to blows".
Antonín Sova wrote an answer in verses, ''To Theodor Mommsen''.
The poem, in which he calls Mommsen a "covetous dotard" and an "arrogant spokesman of slavery",
became the national answer to the German imperialism of that time, and Sova started to be one of the most famous poets of his generation.
Later work
*''Údolí nového království'' (Valley of a New Kingdom, 1900), ''Dobrodružství odvahy'' (Adventures of Courage, 1906) – collections of social poetry, the new utopian kingdom is a symbol of hope
*''Ještě jednou se vrátíme'' (We Will Return Once More, 1900) – intimate poetry about passionate love and the bitterness of life
*''Lyriky lásky a života'' (Lyrics of Love and Life, 1907), ''Drsná láska'' (Scathing Love, 1927) – collections of poems about falling into and recovering from love
*''Povídky a menší črty'' (1903), ''O milkování, lásce a zradě'' (1909) – collections of short stories
*''Ivův román'' (Ivo's Novel, 1902), ''Výpravy chudých'' (The Poor's Tours, 1903), ''Tóma Bojar'' (1910) – psychological and social novels
*''Pankrác Budecius, kantor'' (Pankrác Budecius the Teacher, 1916) – novel about a rural teacher in the 18th century
References
External links
Biography and works(in Czech)
{{DEFAULTSORT:Sova, Antonin
1864 births
1928 deaths
People from Pacov
People from the Kingdom of Bohemia
Czech poets
Czech male poets
Symbolist poets