The Storybook Honza : Reflections on One of the Mental Symbols of the Czech Village in the Second Half of the 19th and the First Decades of the 20th Century

Abstract

The study puts classic Czech fairy tales about the "stupid" Honza into the context of the emancipatory ideology of the Czech countryside, especially the peasantry of the second half of the 19th and the beginning of the 20th century. It shows how deeply the concept was embedded in the national Czech mentality, which survives in the second half of the 20th century.

Keywords

• czech Honza
• archetype of countryman
• emancipation of countryman
• collective identity