Valentin Vodnik, "The First Slovenian Poet": the Politics of Interpretations

Each generation in its own way weighs up and measures the past according to contemporary outlooks in order to give shape to the future. Views of the past and of the future are constantly being modified, supplemented, and adjusted from generation to generation. It is, therefore, inevitable that leaders and prophets take on new personal characteristics and that their reputations change, falling and rising (Gspan 1958: 146). Thus, over the past two centuries, the image of Valentin Vodnik has undergone radical change in accordance with prevailing political conditions. Interpretations of Vodnik’s poetry have also varied with changing political circumstances. This is particularly true of his ode to Napoleon, which he published in his Pismenost (Literacy) of 1811. The poem “Illyria Revived” does not represent the peak of Vodnik’s poetic creativity, nor—in the assessment of Ivan Prijatelj—is it “completely original in its phraseology,” for even the syntagma of “Illyria Revived” had been used by others before him (Prijatelj 1911: 587). It did, however, receive a great response and inspired several generations, each of which read and interpreted it in its own way.