Czech faces of John Donne

The book introduces the Czech reader for the first time in detail to the personality and writing style of John Donne, next to Shakespeare the most important English lyricist of the turn of the 16th and 17th centuries, whose work was also remarkably influential in the 20th century outside the context of his native English literature. It traces the reasons for Donne's attraction to modern poets and critics, including Czech ones, and explores the typical ways of his metaphorical thinking and the ability of his poetry to combine dramatic immediacy and sensitivity with sophisticated intellectual play. Detailed comparative analyses of Czech translations of Donne's secular and spiritual lyrics reflect on the basic problems of translating Donne's style into Czech, characterize the different approaches of six Czech translators to Donne's texts, and, in particular, provide an assessment of the translation concept of the two most important of them, Hana Žantovská and Zdeněk Hron.