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Production of a Literary Map of Ostrava 1918-2018 – a case study about one city in the Czech Republic Cover

Production of a Literary Map of Ostrava 1918-2018 – a case study about one city in the Czech Republic

By: Iva Málková  
Open Access
|Dec 2025

Abstract

Ostrava used to be one of the significant industrial and cultural centres of Silesia. It became part of Czechoslovakia in 1918, with the character of the territory being multi-ethnic, multilingual, and with industrial dynamics. This article explores various approaches to literary cartography and establishes a method of creating a printed Literary Map of Ostrava 1918–2018 (including places, events, personalities, institutions, texts). The map is trying to record the emergence, consolidation and transformation of the literary identity of the city of Ostrava over a period of one hundred years. It presents the aspects that determined the character of the map (including among others, the back part of map which includes interpretations, uses the princip of synecdoche and aspects of complexity too). It depicts the emergence reference of individual points on the map in relation to the historical, socio-economic, political and religious aspects of the city and includes work with temporal and spatial layers which were used in the preparation of the thematic map. The map presents, through the application of synoptic literary map theory, the nature of the semantic network through which literary history is reflected. It explains the inspirational significance of a cartographic treatment of literary history that goes beyond locational character. It not a map of fictional places.

Language: English
Page range: 19 - 29
Submitted on: Mar 9, 2025
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Accepted on: Oct 23, 2025
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Published on: Dec 29, 2025
In partnership with: Paradigm Publishing Services
Publication frequency: 4 issues per year

© 2025 Iva Málková, published by University of Silesia in Katowice, Faculty of Natural Sciences
This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.