Historical fact as a structural element of “Legion-naire’s notes” by Joseph Honza-Dubnitsky

Abstract

Background. The article analyzes historical facts as the structural elements of “Legionnaire’s Notes” by Joseph Honza-Dubnitsky. Synthesis of documentary and ar-tistic is one of the genre dominant of notes in the Slovak literature of the twentieth cen-tury. Slovak authors’ notes are similar to the Ukrainian and Russian works of this gen-re. It encourages drawing parallels, find common features and differences. Purpose. To investigate the features of individual-author’s interpretation of the genre of notes in Joseph Honza-Dubnitsky’s work, in particular to focus on the role of a historical facts as a structural elements of “Legionnaire’s Notes”. Results. In the Slovak literature of the twentieth century genre of notes belong to the non-fiction with a characteristic autobiographical dominant. When narrator’s story is closely intertwined with important historical events, he needs to tell about them, to con-vey to contemporaries and descendants information, to emphasize the role of ordinary person in history. “Legionnaire’s Notes” by J. Honza-Dubnitsky is a thorough docu-mentary book, autobiographical evidence of the participant of the World War І and at the same time a historical study with critical remarks and interpretation of the most im-portant events of the twentieth century. “Legionnaire’s Notes” is a history of Slovaks struggle for its own state. All events are submitted through the prism of the worldview of Slovak Patriot, who aware himself as a participant of global processes and world changes, perceives them and analyzes. J. Honza-Dubnitsky’s work is rich in actual ma-terial, therefore, has literary and historical significance. There are important events, dates, names of famous people mentioned in the text. That information makes the notes a valuable document. At the same time, facts in the work have a subjective, estimated, emotional-personal dominant, which raises them to the level of generalizations and liter-ary interpretation. J. Honza-Dubnitsky does not often talk about the personal, almost does not put himself at the center of the story. The narrator thinks by socially important categories, recognizes, that he is a part of Slovak nation. Together with like-minded people he fights for Slovaks right to be heard in the world political arena. The narrator takes an observer position, captures events, witness and participant of which he is. Key words: genre, notes, autobiographical, historical fact, Slovak literature. Chui, K. I., 2019. Genre features of “Military Doctor’s Notes” by Albert Shkarvan. Studia Slovakistica, 19, pp.261–268. (In Ukrainian) Chui, K., 2021. Alternative view of history in “Notes from the Front 1941–1943” by Matej Oravets. Studia Slovakistica, 20, pp.90–102. (In Slovak) Honza-Dubnicky, J., 2014. Legionnaire’s notes. Banska Bystrica: Vydavateľstvo PRO. (In Slovak) Savenko, I., 2008. The main problems of documentary writing in the context of literary discourse at the turn of the century. Bulletin of Lviv University. Series: Philology. Lviv: LNU im. I. Franka, 44, ch. 2, pp.128–137. (In Ukrainian) Savkyna, Y., 2013. Notes as a “depersonalized diary”: Documentary and artistic potential of the genre. Literature issues, 1, pp.337–354. (In Russian) Shakhova, K. I., 2017. Notes as a genre of Ukrainian prose of the XX–early XXI centuries. Lutsk: Vezha-Druk. (In Ukrainian) Vyktorovych, V. A., 1981. Genre of notes by Tolstoy and Dostoevsky. Lev Tolstoy and Russian Literature. Hor’kyj: Yzdatel’stvo HHU, pp.18–25. (In Russian)