Cornell University Press
The Czech Manuscripts
About this book
The Czech Manuscripts is dedicated to one of the most important literary forgeries on the model of Macpherson's Ossianic poetry. The Queen's Court and Green Mountain Manuscripts, discovered in 1817 and 1818, went on to play an outsized role in the Czech National Revival, functioning as founding texts of the national mythology and serving as sacred works in the long period when they were considered genuine.
A successful literary forgery tells a lot about what a culture wants and needs at a particular moment. One fascinating aspect of this story is how a successful fake was able to function in an integral way as part of the Czech cultural revival of the nineteenth century, both because it played to expectations and nationalist values and because it met real cultural needs in many ways better than genuine historical literary works and artefacts. Also fascinating is the vainglorious Václav Hanka, a prolific and dedicated forger who was likely the center of the conspiratorial ring that created the manuscripts and who went on as the librarian of the Czech National Museum to alter a number of others.
David Cooper analyzes what made the Manuscripts a convincing imitation of their Serbian and Russian models. He looks at how translation shaped their composition and at the benefit ofexamining them as pseudotranslations, and investigates the quasi-religious rituals and commemorative practices that developed around them. The Czech Manuscripts brings the Czech experience into the broader developments of European history.
Author / Editor information
David L. Cooper is Associate Professor of Slavic Languages and Literatures at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. He is the author of Creating the Nation.
Reviews
The Czech Manuscripts has rightfully centered the manuscripts and their reception within the history of the Czech national movement... Cooper's elegantly written book should also provoke larger discussions about authenticity, authorship, and authorial intent in the nineteenth century and today.
Topics
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Frontmatter
i -
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Contents
vii -
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Acknowledgments
ix -
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Note on Transliteration
xi -
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Chronology: Highlights and Lowlights in the Life of the Manuscripts
xiii -
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Introduction: T he Phenomenon of the Manuscripts
1 -
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1. Forgery as a Romantic Form of Authorship: The Manuscripts in Comparative Perspective
28 -
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2. Successful Forgeries: Oral Traditional Epic Poetics in the Czech Manuscripts
43 -
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3. Translation, Pseudotranslation, and the Manuscripts
117 -
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4. Faith, Ritual, and the Manuscripts
146 -
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Conclusion
187 -
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Notes
193 -
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Bibliography
233 -
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Index
247
