98
6. POLEDNE
and experience of morality as constraint to the disagreeable. The only apparently superfluous adjective ‘závazný’ is intended to imply that the narrator to suit his own purpose distinguishes unscrupulously and with formalistic prevarication between vows or promises that are binding and such that are not. His ‘člověk za mzdu’ and ‘jednotvarná práce’ reveal bourgeois disdain for the ordinary working man, to which the elaboration ‘[člověk] na kteréhož se možno spolehnouti’, by invoking an exception, adds a strong hint of basic mistrust. The formulation ‘učinit dvojí zastavení’, used instead of the normal ‘dělat dvě přestávky’, not only betrays ludicrous affectation but may also be taken to suggest a certain conversancy with ‘zastavení’ as a religious term denoting pictures of Jesus carrying the Cross to Calvary. [...] Vždy nechutné a bláhové bylo zarmucovati se nicotou těchto lidí! Přišel bys jako přítel, hluboko se nahýbaje ke dnu jejich srdcí a oni by pokryli tvoji botu slinou z užvýkaného tabáku a obnažili by v úsměšku žluté svoje tesáky. Někteří požádali by tě o malou zapůjčku ve jménu boha trojjediného a v kruhu svých známých doporučili jako ťulpasa prvního řádu. Ano příteli, ku kterému mluvím, zařiď ty se podle nabytých zkušeností!
The narrator’s ‘nechutné’ [...] bylo zarmucovati se’ implies that he normally enjoys melancholy, while ‘vždy’ suggests that he rather masochistically repeats experiences he has found unpleasant. By ‘bláhové [bylo]’ the narrator is expressing regret at having devoted himself to what he believes were the wrong people, whereas the author is insinuating that the narrator’s whole attitude has been foolish. The word ‘nicota’, with its metaphysical background associations, also helps to show up the narrator’s standpoint. The use of the conditional tense in the following paragraph invites us to conclude that the narrator’s claim about his intentions and the men’s reaction are mere conjecture. In ‘[přítel] hluboko se nahýbaje ke dnu jejich [cihláčů] srdcí’, the author is overstretching the standard metaphors ‘hluboko v srdci’ and ‘ve dně / ze dna srdce’ to creat a comically immediate and graphic picture. That the narrator expects the men to spit on his shoes and fleer at him with bared yellow teeth exposes his squeamish affectation and fear of derision. The strength of his aversion particularly to the bodily is brought out and mocked by the contrast between the expansive ‘pokrýt slinou’ and the restrictive singular of ‘bota’. It is meant to come through also in the for the author exaggerated and distorted, because as expressed here falsely direct, connection made between the saliva and the tobacco in ‘slina z užvýkaného tabáku’, as well as in the use of the here not merely colloquially pejorative but implicitly also threateningly bestial ‘tesáky’ for ‘zuby’. In ‘malá zapůjčka’, the narrator wishes us to understand the adjective as reporting sarcastically what the men themselves would be saying, while the author is implying that the men would probably be ask-
Ukázka elektronické knihy, UID: KOS211583
6. POLEDNE
99
ing for truly no more than some small change. Similarly, ‘ve jménu boha trojjediného’, that seems to tell us that the men were exhorting like beggars, is implicitly only the narrator’s tendentious and religiously inflated rendering of the common expletive ‘proboha’. When the narrator says that the men would tell their friends that he is a dupe of the first order, the narrator would like us to believe that it was out of spite at his refusing the loan, while the author is implying that the narrator knows from experience that most people consider him a prime fool. This is implicitly confirmed by the subsequent ‘zařiď [...] se podle nabytých zkušeností’. That the narrator addresses this last remark to a hitherto unmentioned friend he claims to have been talking to suggests that he is used to carrying on imaginary conversations, so divorced is he from reality. Ustalo zvonění, ustala i hokynářka v hlasité persifláži andělského pozdravení [...] Náměstí se vyprázdnilo, jenom některá služka blížila se k výčepu se skleněnou konvicí. Bylo poledne, chvíle kusého odpočinku, který zde neposílí a neblaží...
The narrator’s curious and unconvincing assertion that the woman grocer was parodying an angelic greeting is an ironic reminder of his importunate religiosity. This religiosity is meant to be implicit also in the use of anaphora in ‘ustalo zvonění, ustala i hokynářka’, reminiscent as it is of the style of the Beatitudes. Consistent with the social snobbery imputed to the narrator is his use of ‘hokynářka’, with its potential strong negative connotations, for ‘zelinářka’ or ‘ovocnářka’; and his use of the at the time still rather distinguished foreign borrowing ‘persifláž’ for ‘posměšné napodobení’. The adjective ‘hlasitý’, pointing out seemingly unnecessarily the wholly usual loudness of the woman’s call, hints again at the narrator’s oversensitivity to noise. That the narrator imagines the woman fetching beer to be a maidservant, not just an ordinary housewife, brings out his bourgeois perspective again. His use of ‘skleněná konvice’ for ‘džbán’ supports this by suggesting that he is familiar only with jugs of the smaller, more elegant sort that are made not of glass but often of choice materials like silver or pewter. The closing remark ‘[poledne] chvíle kusého odpočinku, který [...] neblaží’ is meant to show up and mock the narrator’s longing for profound spiritual repose and beatitude that we are to assume has provided the incongruous standard here. The eccentricity of the narrator’s position is ironically emphasized by his use of ‘kusý’, a word which normally collocates far more strongly with terms like ‘vzpomínky’, ‘znalosti’, and, crucially, ‘práce’. It is precisely the standard collocation ‘kusá práce’ that provides the ironic counterfoil to ‘kusý odpočinek’, suggesting that when it comes to work and rest the narrator’s priorities are oddly inverted. Examining ‘Poledne’, we have seen authorial irony gradually reveal the narrator as a comic figure divorced from the reality of life. The particular
Ukázka elektronické knihy, UID: KOS211583
100
6. POLEDNE
characteristics exemplifying this basic attitude of the narrator include an obsessive religiosity tending towards asceticism; a rigid formalism not excluding a childishly fanciful romanticism; an extreme timidity and oversensitivity both physical and aesthetic; and a presumably bourgeois affectation. The small town and its inhabitants, which are the object of the narrator’s attack, are by comparison ultimately normal and unexceptionable.
Ukázka elektronické knihy, UID: KOS211583