A History of Bohemian Literature. hrabe Francis Lützow
hardly belong to a history of literature; yet the Kniha starého pána z Rožmberka, the book of the old Lord of Rosenberg, deserves mention. It contains an enumeration of the laws and customs of Bohemia as they existed in the author's time. It is the oldest prose work in the Bohemian language, and dates either from the beginning of the fourteenth or from the last years of the thirteenth century. Another early legal work is the Výklad na pravo zemske, exposition of the law of the land, which is attributed to Andrew of Duba. Several other very early Bohemian writings on legal matters have been preserved.
One of the earliest and most curious prose works in the Bohemian language is the singular dialogue known as Tkadleček the Weaver. The book was one of the first that were printed when the revival of the Bohemian literature in the present century began. It was published by Wenceslas Hanka[22] in 1824, and was greatly admired. Recently the value of the book has, I think, been unduly depreciated. It certainly abounds with affectations and conceits such as were usual in the literature of most countries at the time—about 1407—when the book appeared; yet the complaints of the lover sometimes reveal a touch of real passion, and the style is generally fluent and lively. The monotony and the repetitions for which the lovers' long speeches are blamed are no peculiarity of the Weaver but rather are ever inherent to the speech of the discarded and distressful lover. Far inferior to the speeches of the lover are the answers of the personified Misfortune to whom he addresses his complaint.
Of the author of this very interesting work little is known. His Christian name was Ludvik, and he represents himself as being himself the discarded lover who addresses his complaint to Misfortune. He adopted the name of the Weaver, being, as he writes, "a weaver of learned lines." He was, according to recent research, not a nobleman of the Bohemian court, as had been formerly supposed, but a literary man who was in the service of the Dowager-Queen Elizabeth at Königgrätz, employed as a "writer" in some not clearly defined position. While it thus appears that the Weaver was a man of comparatively humble position, a more thorough study of the book has also proved that the fair Adlička, who had forsaken him to marry another, was not, as has been written, "one of the beauties of the Bohemian court," but that she was (as her lover indeed himself tells us) employed at that court as a "topička" (literally, lighter of fires), a word that we must reluctantly translate by "housemaid". Ludvik is, therefore, yet another instance of the facility with which a literary man idealises his mistress. It has been proved in recent years that the Weaver in many respects resembles a somewhat earlier German book entitled Der Ackermann aus Beheim, which dates from the year 1399. Without entering into the controversy that has arisen on this subject, it will be sufficient to state that the Weaver is not an adaptation, far less a translation of the German work, though there are certainly many resemblances between the two books. It may be interesting to quote part of one of the laments which the Weaver addresses to Misfortune. He thus expresses his grief: "After a loss a man often incurs mockery; the sorrow of others is to many an object of ridicule, such as thou hast bestowed on me, O unfortunate Misfortune! Through thee this has happened to me, the unhappy and thrice unhappy weaver. This all know and feel, this they fully understand. For already have all said and loudly affirmed it, that my most delightful, most excellent serving-maid[23] has been endowed with diverse gifts, happy and most choice; greater were her gifts than any that Nature has allowed any one to have; for all these gifts that she had from fortune, she had them not from fortune only; she obtained them also from the supreme Creator. Not only was she endowed with goodly customs, but a shapely form, a beautiful figure, and noble birth also God gave her, who had chosen her for her virtues and (who gave her also) much that was very good, sweet, and honourable; hardly ever has God given to one person so many remarkable, good, and prosperous gifts. And yet you mockingly tell me that my most excellent serving-maid, my most beloved maiden, is not different from others. And not only this (do you say), but also that I could find many other matrons and maids such as she, did I but cast glances around me. … I wonder at this: what devil has sent you to me? what devil gave you power over me? what devil or what demon,[2] or what fiend[24] has roused you and instigated you against me? I wonder indeed at the meaning of this. I trust in my Creator for this, that He has not given you this power, and that you have not from Him this authority, and that this is by no means just. But you tell me that God has instructed you—chosen you for this! but I know not this; rather do I know that I have been deprived of all my comfort, of all my pleasure, of all good merriment; to me is bequeathed poverty and eternal grief; my name is marked out and written down in the doleful register of the longing and anxious ones until I die. Now indeed there is truly discord between me and the beloved and adored one; now indeed there is a quarrel worse than all other quarrels and discords. This indeed may be called truly discord and anger, which never again will change to peace. Oh, that I should ever have known what wrath between two lovers is. Alas and again alas, and woe to you, wicked, infamous Misfortune! Oh, wicked Misfortune, now, indeed, through your evil anger all my happiness, and with it my youth, is at an end. Why then am I still alive? what can I rejoice over? in what can I find pleasure? where can I seek refuge in this my great need? What shall I now love, what can I love now that everything is lost to me. In what shall I now find pleasure, what shall render me merry and happy, when I no longer love her through whom everything appeared lovable to me. Little now will be my joy, for little mercy shall I find. … And for what purpose have you endeavoured to do this, shameful, wicked, false Misfortune? Alas, alas! Woe, ever woe to thee. Gone is all my grace, gone are all my many qualities. O Misfortune, to whom shall I now go for counsel in this my hateful adversity? to whom shall I complain of my loss in this my depression and sorrow? I have no one to whom to complain of my misfortunes, of whatever nature they may be, except you, evil, disagreeable, and displeasing Misfortune, from whom I expect no relief.
"Alas, alas, and again alas! What yearnings have besieged me, what woe has bound me, what orphanage (i.e. bereavement) has subdued me! What longings and more than longings have overwhelmed me, and still overwhelm me from day to day, from hour to hour, so that I know of them neither beginning, nor middle, nor end. I am like a child that has been separated from its mother before the time, like a kitten which, though not yet grown up, is deprived of milk. As the colt of an ass that has not yet acquired strength is driven and forced to work before the time, thus I, evil Misfortune, am subject to you and given over to you before the time and in my youthful years; and still I do not know in what manner and wherefore and by whose orders. Alas, alas, O Misfortune! were it but possible that you, instead of Lot's wife, could be changed into that statue of salt, then at last your end would be certain. For it is you, O Misfortune, evil and shameful, and yet again evil Misfortune, who hast made of me more than a widower, more than an orphan, more than a man in whom all hope is dead. Every widower, when he is deprived of her who comforts him and loses her—knowing that it cannot be otherwise, and that his wife cannot return to him—gets over it, and so to speak forgets her, if not for ever, yet occasionally. But how should I forget my dearest, my most excellent and most beloved serving-maid? for she is yet alive, she is yet in good health, she is full of strength; she is as the pastime for another, not for me. And yet greater therefore is my bitterness, my sorrow, my anguish."
A short extract from one of Misfortune's replies to the Weaver will be sufficient. I shall here quote from Mr. Wratislaw's translation: "How much more fortunate then dost thou desire to be that I may honour thee more than the Emperor Julius or the King Alexander, or the excellent, truly excellent Emperor Charles, at this time king of Bohemia? who, powerful as they were, could not at times escape my power and my contrariety. Prithee, imagine how many of my misadventures have happened to those only whom thou knowest, and of whom thou hast heard in thine own days, whether of higher or lower rank; and neither thou nor any one else will be able to express in writing or words how many times this has happened to them. … If thou wilt, as thou canst, recollect thine own adversities only in thine own mind, how many of them hast thou also had from me? For it would have been more proper to cry out against me about them, or to argue with me about that which once threatened thy life, thy property, thy honour, and all the good that thou hadst, and it would have been convenient to speak of that rather than of that damsel of thine. Therefore, Weaver, hold thy peace, speak no more with me of thy darling."
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