Masky touhy Úvaha ajvazovská

The interpretational study „Masks of Desire“ is based on the novel by Michal Ajvaz – Cesta na jih [Journey to the South] although its line of argument takes considerable account of the author’s entire fictional and theoretical output to date, as the connection both between individual fictional texts and between them and the theoretical texts is very close and evident here. First the study casts doubt on the classification of Michal Ajvaz’s work as postmodernist, as this only applies — as in the case of other „labels“ (magic Prague literature, magical realism) that have been stuck on Ajvaz’s work — on the basis of superficial similarities. This study does not refute the association with formal principles of discourse that is designated postmodern, but it does stress that Ajvaz’s work departs intellectually from such discourse, while referring at the same time to the author’s repeated polemics with postmodernism at the level of theoretical considerations. Attention is also focused on the concept of the „total void“, the intertextual and self­reflective aspect of the author’s work, the relationship to myth or the motif of desire and the specific conception of the erotic.