Abstract
Following its destruction on 10th June 1942, the Central Bohemian village of Lidice developed into a multifaceted symbol whose various interpretations were far from convergent. It represented suffering in war as well as bravery of the Czech everyman; after the war, Lidice was veiled into hefty symbolism, becoming an emblem of peace, of amity between the nations, and, in time, of socialism.
The present article surveys texts of both lyrical and epic (or documentary) poetry where the symbolic topos of Lidice was employed in diverse ways. Quite reasonably, the authors utilized motifs which dated back to speeches, delivered by politicians in the early years following the Lidice massacre, and to literary creations of popular origin.
The main motifs and symbols in the analyzed texts include: the peaceful rural life of peasant and miner/collier families, their suffering (even bordering on martyrdom), the collective guilt of Germans and revenge upon them for the destruction of Lidice, or the motif of God (in some of the texts). The customary socialist imagery of the built-anew Lidice was absent in the poems except for in two pieces depicting a better (i.e. socialist and pro-Soviet) future.