Edition Domesticum

Pectus publishing house, Košice 2017

The collection of poems “Result: No Solution” represents a selection of the author’s work which has been developed since her youth up till now. Although the poems do not refer to concrete temporal and spatial coordinates, they are not about wandering about unknown places at an unknown time. Quite on the contrary, they express a view of common events and sum up what is important in them for man who often reaches a deadlock because of many mental, animal, social etc. restrictions. And behind this all, which can be anticipated in chaos as something bland or invisible, there is an effort to capture something permanent and lean on to solid points that help to decipher the truths about the world.

Pectus publishing house, Košice 2017

Vlado’s short stories about irreversible deformations located in a city environment do not examine an inanimate technical material, but focus on the human being, their reactions and relationships, which are ultimately geared towards a turn, collapse or destruction. Short samples of fiction, however, do not show any trace of hard tragic, but make us smile by their gentle humour and irony. We find here literature per se, writing as such being topicalized, but also narratives about a mentally disturbed man and loneliness that can bring fulfilment and about a man with naive ideas who had trouble-free childhood in the 1960s of the twentieth century and about complicated growing up against the background of the period events. The short stories complement each other, forming a sequence which enables us to arrive at the meaning that is intended. Of these, two stories – The Landscape and The Neighbour – were given a reward in a literary competition “The Short Story” in 2014 and 2015. Their order is not coincidental, either; many of them refer to the previous one at a certain moment. It becomes apparent that the work is a thought through concept whose whole stands or falls on individual stories.

Pectus publishing house, Košice 2017

In the collection “Just to Live Here” Šidlík offers poems from the 2006-2012 period. He develops here his distinctive and decent poetics and captures rhythmically flowing moments which are often felt in a relationship with the gentle sex. Indeed, many things remain untold. Inspirations from Japanese and Chines poetic traditions can also be felt in the author’s work. Although the poems may look straightforward at first sight, it is necessary to re-read them time and again so that the whole becomes apparent by individual connections. The poems may also reveal that to daydream and just watch is not enough. Anyway, even if man indulgences in memories, he needs to live despite estrangement and needs to make his dreams come true here and now.

Pectus publishing house, Košice 2016

Svätopluk experiences the childhood in times when the Slavs get acquainted with Christianity through the Frankish priests. During the games with his peers he develops the characteristics which the future ruler should have – brightness, bravery and power. He shows those characteristics during the expedition into the regions inhabited by mysterious Heruli. He needs to deal with the loss of his friend Vilo, who as a propagator of the new doctrine becomes a victim of adherents of old faith, paganism... Mária Kočanová (born in 1890 in Kostoľany nad Hornádom and died in 1976 in Bratislava) is the author of several books for children and adults (Legends of Šariš, Silent Monk, etc.), published by Saint Adalbert Association till 1948. Her works also included drama production, especially for the radio. She lived in Prešov except the last years of her life and she worked as a teacher in Solivar. The highlight of her creative forces was to be a trilogy of the Great Moravia times she started to write in the interwar period. However, only one part of the trilogy remained in existence and was published as With Perun on a Shield in 2014. The novella Mojmír’s Son consists of two separate chapters of this part, not included into the published novel. Further destiny of the future Moravian prince had to be reflected in other trilogy parts.

Pectus publishing house, Košice 2016

The author offers a poetic story in his latest book in line with the concept of the previously published books of poetry. The man of the story experiences the nightlife in a block of flats and also in the street. Hatala has been the author of reflexive poetry for some years. He intentionally writes about the family, humans, current social and political situations towards which he is not very indulgent. Although the stories are not defined geographically, the reader may recognize many things including the character of the period reflected in the author’s covert stories.

Pectus publishing house, Košice 2015

Not only does literature take no notice of the world of contemporary outsiders, but it does not usually happen that anti-heroes, sometimes coming from a cyberpunk background, are unsettled by situations when seemingly nothing happens. The way they communicate points out rather non-sense outside them than emptying of their speech. This comes to expression perhaps in the most fitting manner in the short story The Pit, which gives a whole picture of the mire of the society. After reading a couple of short stories there is a trace which forces us to think that that it is possible to get over absurd, rough and mistaken circumstances only by irony and keeping distance from events. Certainly, he who has enough to eat does not believe the one who does not. Fortunately, Fajčák is not put off by his attitude. He creates his own truth in the short stories. So is it not so bad in reality? Even worse for reality.

Pectus publushing house, Košice 2014

Teasing one's teachers and girl friends among a bunch of pals, carelessly hidden envy, but also dreams and cravings for love. Will the author succeed in avoiding a cliché so that the major protagonist Silvia did not seduce the physics teacher Dodo and did not become pregnant? Will she give Dodo a chance to fight for his wife when the mesmeric Džulio appears on the scene or will she make of him an iconic little character from a small town, a weak man devoid of any ambitions who is known to us from Russian literature? In the episodic line, which comprises a galaxy of a great many characters and which does not believe in a grand story, there is no philosophy nor any deep backup plan. However, it is possible to believe the view of life of simple people from the period of normalization, including their everyday joys and sorrows. Behind the facade of a naivety there is a convincing form of interpersonal relations, which are not influenced by a political situation. Due to the author's ability to transcend the boundaries between the narrator and characters the reader is invited to take a peep into the thinking, feeling and value hierarchy of the major protagonists almost effortlessly.

Pectus publishing house, Košice 2014

A fifteen-year old daughter Sajava of the Croatian prince Ljudevit is to marry Zvonimír, the son of the Moravian prince Mojmír in order to solidify the unity of the Slavic people. Before the wedding took place, the whimsical and roguish girl had been kidnapped by Baldrik, the son of the Fuldian prince, who fell in love with her as a prisoner at her father's. She is saved by the one who was given to her – Zvonimír. In this way, he arouses not only thankfulness but also passionate but unrequited love in his bride-to-be. Their happiness does not last forever, though. Zvonimír dies in a battle with the Avars, Slovenians win with many losses on their part... In the panoramic portrayal of the life in the Great Moravia in the 9th century when Christianity started to spread here, there are also characters who are a product of the author´s fiction, authentic personalities, Great Moravian noblemen Pribina, Mojmír, Rastislav as well as the future ruler Svätopluk. There is a shift of the plot from the region around Nitra and the Moravian-Slovak borders to the Adriatic Sea and the Court of the French ruler. The first, completed part of the intended trilogy in terms of the plot – the manuscript of the second instalment with a torso of the third one was destroyed during the war – draws on the remaining parts of the decade since its inception. In this manner, the prolific, Catholically-minded prose writer, dramatist, author of juvenile fiction, later on deprived of the possibility to publish, rekindles the awareness of readers.

Pectus publishing house, Košice 2014

The poetry cycle "At the Mercy or Not" originated in 1982-1986. Changing images and an emphasis on the stream of consciousness impose high requirements on the reader. Many paraphrases and references as well as ancient, Indian or Christian symbols rely on his/her intellectual knowledge without which their interpretation would not be possible. The focus on introspection and self-reflection draws on the Montaignean tradition, and the efforts to understand the self and the human existence. The extent to which the author succeeded in managing the risk of an unsuitable entropy is to be judged by the reader.

Pectus publishing house, Košice 2014

The poems transcend privacy and the public images are many a time accompanied by a Kafkaesque motif of an unidentifiable pressure. Seeing other aspects of reality takes on a psychedelic dimension where a mistake or a small deviation from the normal is fair enough for the collapse of the world and this moment is topped up by a period context of suspicion. The works of this author brim with a cultivated expression and sense of abbreviation, which forces us to re-evaluatethe substitution of sudden interconnections for the internal ones with hindsight.