Jiří Dynka

Jiří Dynka

Poet, born on 4 October 1959 in Zlín. He is one of the few contemporary Czech poets who has remained within his genre without moving over to prose or elsewhere.


Title Publisher Year Selected published translations Awards
Mother Liked Cherries (Matka měla ráda třešně) Druhé město 2023
Cafes (Kavárny) Archa 2015
Blood in the Other World of Jiří Veselský (Krev na onom světě Jiřího Veselského) Druhé město 2013
Let´s Run and Gather Pink Geraniums (Poběžme natrhat růžové kakosty) Větrné mlýny 2012
The Olšany Cemeteries Educational Trail (Naučná stezka Olšanské hřbitovy) Větrné mlýny 2010
Effusion (Tamponáda) Druhé město 2006
Sussex Superstar (Sussex Superstar) Petrov 2002
Livia-like, Lenka-like (Líviový lenkový) Klokočí a Knihovna Jana Drdy 2000
Wrong! (Wrong!) Petrov 1998
In the Closest Proximity to the Freezer (Minimální okolí mrazicího boxu) Větrné mlýny 1997
Mother Liked Cherries
Matka měla ráda třešně
Kavárny
Cafes
Kavárny
Krev na onom světě Jiřího Veselského
Blood in the Other World of Jiří Veselský
Krev na onom světě Jiřího Veselského
Let´s Run and Gather Pink Geraniums
Poběžme natrhat růžové kakosty
The Olšany Cemeteries Educational Trail
Naučná stezka Olšanské hřbitovy
Tamponáda
Effusion
Tamponáda
Sussex Superstar
Sussex Superstar
Sussex Superstar
Líviový lenkový
Livia-like, Lenka-like
Líviový lenkový
Wrong!
Wrong!
Wrong!
Minimální okolí mrazicího boxu
In the Closest Proximity to the Freezer
Minimální okolí mrazicího boxu
Praise
God is of use to me only when I feel bad”! This is how simply and literally the poem on an outing closes. And in fact the majority of the poems in this collection are an outing, no longer the abrupt motion of a sprinter. The necrophilic tenderness in the poet’s rough strength has once again deepened.
—Dora Kaprálová
MF Dnes

His first work came out at the end of the 1980s under the pseudonym of Otík Bzenecký by Host publishers. At this point he was working as a heating operator at the Strahov halls of residence while also devoting his time to writing – and not to the civil engineering that he had studied at Brno University of Technology. Following the Velvet Revolution he published in literary magazines, though his first book, Minimální okolí mrazicího boxu (The Closest Proximity to the Freezer, Větrné mlýny), wasn’t published until 1997. This was followed a year later by the collection Wrong! (Petrov, 1998). Both require the reader to understand verse which resists understanding – however, if the reader abandons attempts to understand everything and contents himself with the rhythm and concept of the poem as a collage “speaking with a stammering cybernetic newspeak made up of clumps of adjectives,” as critic Radim Kopáč wrote about Dynka, then they will receive much food for thought. Jan Antonín Pitínský adapted the first collection for the theatre.

The collection Líviový lenkový (Livia-like, Lenka-like, Klokočí a Knihovna J. Drdy, 2000) is written in a similar vein. “In the collection Líviový lenkový, Dynek’s expression is closer to that of traditionally viewed poetry with its verse and stanza character, though the alternation of the type and size of lettering persists. Dynek’s characters are increasingly engaged in their bizarre pleasures, while existential themes are only marked by their absence,” wrote critic Karel Piorecký.

The collection Sussex Superstar (Petrov, 2002) then presents the reader with an entirely carnal love and eroticism: “When she spreads her legs / I see a cherry in the twilight. To bite the skin / back / buttocks. A cigarette thrust into a grapefruit / a lover’s finger.” Critic Dora Kaprálová wrote of the book that: “In his latest collection, between the lines Dynka didactically warns the reader that human life is a short-lived crystal surrounded by cremation, shredding and sex. It does so with a necrophiliac tenderness of ageing lyricism.” This was followed four years later by Tamponáda (Effusion, Druhé město, 2006) the down side of carnality – after pleasure comes pain and illness.

Naučná stezka olšanské hřbitovy (The Olšany Cemeteries Educational Trail, Větrné mlýny, 2010) follows city parks, where Dynka is still a lyric poet who sees the poem as a force field. Jiří Vyorálek and Michal Bumbálek adapted the collection for radio. Two years later there followed the collection Poběžme natrhat růžové kakosty (Let’s Run and Gather Pink Geraniums, Větrné mlýny, 2012): “Always go out at the weekend… / more like a branch… like a stream / a meandering walk…let it be a clear day… / a few clouds is OK… / a notebook to hand…”

A year later he published the collection Krev na onom světě Jiřího Veselského (Blood in the Other World of Jiří Veselský, Druhé město, 2013). The poems are based on the memories of and correspondence with a Kyjov poet and lover of women. The collection, therefore, forms an inventory of the loves of Jiří Veselský.

Contacts
E: jiri.dynka@gmail.com