Překlady Josefa Lindy ze Shakespeara

In the context of the reception of Shakespeare in the early period of the Czech National Revival from the 1780s to the 1830s, the paper discusses the contribution of the writer Josef Linda (1789/1792?–1834), who published a series of commented selected passages from Shakespeare’s plays in the literary magazine Čechoslav in 1822–1823. The earliest reception of Shakespeare’s oeuvre paralleled the developing revival of the Czech language and original literature, using the limited media available. The first publications were two chapbooks by an anonymous author outlining the plots of Macbeth and The Merchant of Venice printed in 1782 without stating the name of the author, adapted from German versions. The first Czech version bearing the playwright’s name was the simplified prose translation of Macbeth by Karel Hynek Thám, published and staged in 1786. Several minor contributions (short passages from plays, quotations, short playwright’s biographies) were published in magazines. The series of Linda’s translations is specific, he called short passages from plays “vejpisy” (“extracts”) and used them to illustrate various human qualities (veracity, flattery, straightness) and supposed views of the playwright (Shakespeare on music). They also included a short article on Elizabethan theatre. His knowledge of Shakespeare is also perceptible in his play Jaroslav Šternberg v boji proti Tatarům (1823, Jaroslav of Šternberg Fighting the Tatars). Being published in one of the earliest Czech literary magazines with a wide readership, Linda’s translations thus contributed to Czech acquaintance with the playwright’s oeuvre.