ղľáԾ
Through her characters, she depicts the backwardness of ruralsociety and the problems of real people’s fates. The title of thenovella Ťapákovci (The Ťapáks) (1914) has become synonymous
in ia with the stale conservatism and apathy of rural life.
Before writing Ťapákovci, the author had been active as a writerfor nearly thirty years, with poems and short prose works of herspublished in newspapers and magazines both in ia and in
publications in the USA. As a mature writer, she depicts inŤapákovci certain inhabitants of the village in which she lived,displaying great psychological insight and incurring the anger andhatred of some of her local community for the brutal honesty ofher portraits. Individual members of the Ťapák family – siblingsliving together with their families in a shared tumbledown house
– symbolize both people‘s inability to change their own lowsocial standing and also the deeply ingrained nature of feudalfamily relations. On the one hand, it seems they are keepingtogether as afamily; on the other, their ties stop them fromdeveloping as people. The first to realize this is the oldest sister,Iľa. She tries to bring order to their lives and improve themsomehow, for which sheearns the nickname, ‘Queenie‘. Theothers reject her efforts at change and so she leaves home. Asidefrom general fecklessness and apathy, though, the characters alsoshow passion and adesire for love and better conditions. Theirnicknames give us insight into their personalities: as well as Iľathe Queen, another key character is the cripple Anča the Adder,ardently yearning for love.
