Narrative
The Ťapák Clan
Ťapákovci
Božena Slančíková-Timrava · 1914
Synopsis
At the Ťapáks', three married brothers, their wives and children, the youngest, Mišo, still unmarried, and their disabled sister Anča live crowded together in an old dilapidated house, faithful to the customs of their ancestors: fieldwork is only begun there on a Friday. Iľa, the wife of the eldest, Paľo, proud and the most educated in the family, whom they call the queen, wants to bring order and cleanliness to it and runs up against everyone's apathy. Anča, whom they call a viper, silently loves a boy from the village who is married to another woman.
Context
The story appears in 1914; its author had by then been publishing poems and short prose pieces for nearly thirty years in Slovak newspapers and reviews, even in the Slovak publications of the United States. She paints without complacency the backwardness of the village, ties inherited from feudal times that hold the family together but prevent each person from growing, and, beneath the apathy, a desire for love and a better life. Her portraits of real villagers are so frank that some in her circle resent her for them. The family's name has become in Slovakia a synonym for conservatism and inertia, and Norma L. Rudinsky translated the story into English in 1992.
Who it is for
A short, lively tale in a flavourful popular language, which can be read in English in the collection That Alluring Land.
Prizes and reception
The best-known work of its author, regarded as one of the most critical texts in Slovak literature toward the village.