Knihy básní 1+2

Books of Poems 1 and Books of Poems 2 present the complete poetic work of Andrej Stankovič, thus completing the publication of the author's Writings, which began in 2008 with the volumes Josef Florian and Stará Říše and Co dělát, kej Kolja vítěží.

Stankovič's six collections are divided into two volumes: Book of Poems 1 includes collections first published in samizdat, the double collection Night Sound of a Pioneer Trumpet – Patagonia and Liberated Babylon (Slovenský Raj), which was published in the volume Poetry (Expedice Edition 1979), and five years later the book Variations. Kecybely. Elegy. Nikdycinky (Expedice Edition 1984). Book of Poems 2 contains collections already published in print: To by tak hralo, aby neprestalo (Petrov 1995), the bibliophile Obskurník (Society of Czech Bibliophiles 1999) and the last, as yet unpublished in its entirety, Šarišské haiku, of which a larger part was published in a magazine (Revolver Revue No. 46/2001). The supplement consists of poems that were not included in any of the collections and were printed only in samizdat anthologies or were found in the author's archive.

The critically prepared text of the author's poems is accompanied by comments.

"Stankovič's verses could be defined by their function of cleansing the language of its degraded, automated, dehumanized scum. But that is, I believe, only one aspect of his writing style. In addition, there is his unique authorial initiative, probably not purposefully programmed, but more or less involuntary, improvised and juvenile, but all the more pure, and it lies in how he fits into the developmental series in which avant-garde trends replaced older forms of romanticism, only to be replaced by other avant-gardes, seeking new fields of poetics in the play with language, in nonsense and absurdity. Stankovič's work is not, it seems to me, about the poetic nonsense, but rather about the poetic nonsense."

(From Josef Vohryzek's review of the Patagonia collection, 26. 5. 1970)

Prepared for publication and written by Lucie Bartoňová. Robert Krumphanzl collaborated in the editing