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The page of Šikula, Vincent, English biography

Image of Šikula, Vincent
Šikula, Vincent
(1936–2001)

Biography

(*19. 10. 1936 Dubová – †16. 6. 2001 Modra)

Prose writer and poet Vincent Šikula studied theology in Nitra from 1948 till 1950. After the monastery in Nitra was disbanded, he left for high school in Modra and later studied music at a conservatory in Bratislava. Between 1959 and 1961 he worked as an organist in a church in Ivánka na Dunaji and between 1961 and 1964 as a teacher in Modra. At the end of the ´60´s he worked briefly for the monthly Romboid.  From 1969 till 1973 he was employed as a screenplay editor. From 1973 till 1992 (the year of his retirement), he worked as an editor for the publishing house Slovenský spisovateľ. Vincent Šikula lived and died in Bratislava, but his writing is connected with Modra and its surroundings.
His debut was a collection of short stories, Na koncertoch sa netlieska (1964), based on his experiences from the military service. In the same year he published a second collection of short stories Možno si postavím bungalov. These two prosaic texts are connected by the theme of a young man searching for his role in life. His next novel, S Rozárkou (1966), was a  „balladic prosaic text“ about a mentally handicapped girl. Stories published in the book Nebýva na každom vŕšku hostinec (1966) describe the fates of marginal people who posses great internal strength. A collection of short stories, Povetrie (1968), focuses on the further experiences of characters from his previous prosaic texts. In the ´70´s these texts were followed by a trilogy entitled: Majstri (1976), Muškát (1977) and Vilma (1979). It describes the events of WWII and its aftermath as perceived and experienced in Slovak countryside. In 1978 he published a romantic novel Vlha and in 1980 an autobiographic text, Liesky, relating some parts of his life at the end of the ´50´s.
His next novel, Vojak (1981), describes the fate of a war invalid. In 1983 followed the historical novel Matej as well as a collection of essays entitled Nokturná. During the ´80´s and ´90´s he published a series of texts  (stories, novellas, novels). Out of these the most interesting are: stories from the collection Pôstny menuet (1994) and the novel Veterná ružica (1995), portraying the fate of small people with no influence on great history, who often become its victims.
Šikula wrote several books for children and young people – worth mentioning are Prázdniny so strýcom Rafaelom (1966) and Ďuro, pozdrav Ďura (1978). Vajíčko sliepky liliputánky (1981), O múdrom kohútikovi (1984), Augustín a zvon (1996) and Medardove rozprávky (1997) were written for smaller children. Šikula is also author of several collections of poetry, such as Z domu na kopci (1983), Zo zanedbanej záhrady (1993), Bubeník september-  (1998) and  Za odchodom orgovánu (2003), published posthumously.
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