as in the case of Bohemia and its military neighbors, and in comparing the tragedies and joys of our earthly life as individuals with the course of the planets.
Neruda’s “Ballady a Romance” (Ballads and Romances) is almost wholly devoted to his own nation and people. The poems in his “Prosté Motivy” (Simple Motives) are arranged according to the four seasons of the year which inspired the thoughts on nature and are the most exquisite contribution to literary impressionism in the Czech language. His last poetic collection, “Zpěvy Páteční” (Friday Songs), voices a deep consciousness of allegiance to a nation great in its ideals, yet greater in its sanctified sufferings and sacrifices.
Neruda produced one tragedy, “Francesca di Rimini,” and several light comedies, which latter have been popular. In fact, certain of these comedies were reprinted from memory and produced in trenches or in camps by the Czechoslovak soldiers who for over five years have been in Russia and Siberia.
There is a freedom and independence in his realism which makes his figures as clear-cut as medallions. They are usually characters in his own intimately known Prague, some of them drawn exclusively from types known in his boyhood home, as in “Povidky Malostranské” (Small Side Tales) and others from the wider Prague in “Pražské Obrázky (Prague Pictures) and “Různí Lidé” (Various Sorts of People). Social problems are laid open to the very quick in
