“An invincible Czech horde”: Political and Social Implications of Abstract Moravian Folklore in Milan Kundera’s The Joke

Authors

  • Edwige Tamalet Talbayev Department of French ,Yale University, New Haven, CT, USA

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.17161/folklorica.v15i0.4025

Abstract

This article studies the treatment of Moravian folk music in Milan Kundera ́s 1967 first novel, The Joke (Žert). Reconstructed as the performative practice through which timeless collective memory is enacted, folklore appears as a vector of resistance to state-sponsored Communism in the post-utopian context of the novel. By probing the limitations and potentialities of this vision, this argument sheds light on the complex intersections of folklore, tradition, and collective identity in Communist Czechoslovakia and paves the way for a critical consideration of identitarian discourses based on a mythical reconstruction of the past.

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Published

2021-07-13

Issue

Vol. 15 (2010): Folklorica

Section

Articles

License

Authors retain copyright and grant the journal right of first publication. Their work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Non-Derivative License (CC BY ND) that allows others to share the work with an acknowledgment of the work's authorship and initial publication in this journal. You can find more information about the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Derivative License (CC BY ND) here. 

How to Cite

Talbayev, Edwige Tamalet. 2021. “‘An Invincible Czech horde’: Political and Social Implications of Abstract Moravian Folklore in Milan Kundera’s The Joke”. FOLKLORICA - Journal of the Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Folklore Association 15 (July). https://doi.org/10.17161/folklorica.v15i0.4025.