Review article

Moja zemja – Pod Učkun: the literary motif and or symbol of the Učka Mountain in the chakavian poetry of Drago Gervais

Vjekoslava Jurdana orcid.org/0000-0003-2277-3795 ; Education Sciences Department, The Juraj Dobrila University, Pula, Pula, Croatia

Abstract

Drago Gervais (Opatija, 18 April 1904 – Sežana, 1 July 1957) was a poet, prose writer, dramatist, essayist, feuilltonist, historian, culture and social pro­fessional, but above all, a patriot. His departure from Opatija, from his native Liburnia, the never-forgotten native region, remained as an eternal wound on his poetic heart. From his exile position, he started writing his Chakavian verses, which are considered anthological in Croatian literature. Gervais’s paradigmatic poem is Moja zemja (My Country), which was, in the origi­nal version (Čakavski stihovi - Chakavian Verses), 1929), published in eight parts. The fifth part later gained its independence under the title Pod Učkun (Beneath the Učka), which became accepted. This paper is an analysis of the integral original eight-part version of the poem and interprets its thematic, motivic, conceptual and symbolic elements which are, as the paper shows, fundamentally linked to the poetic and ethical topos of Učka at multiple le­vels.

Keywords

Drago Gervais; Chakavian poetry; Učka; motif; symbol

Hrčak ID:

231973

URI

https://hrcak.srce.hr/231973

Publication date:

31.12.2019.

Article data in other languages: croatian

Visits: 3.093 *