Haul I: Ideas, Information...Ow!

I stopped by the department yesterday to see if Doctor S. was in his office, thinking, "If he's there, then I'll return around five to pick up the essays. If he isn't, then I can wait until Monday." I was counting on him not being there. He was, however in his office. I returned at quarter to five to pick up the papers and wound up granting a couple of extensions (me! extensions! power!) and running into Doctor Cz. My backpack, which was already what most people would call "full," gradually stuffed itself with more books until it was ready to burst: laptop, full water bottle, dinner, fifteen 10-15-page papers, the three books I had checked out of the library on Thursday intending to read them at home, four books on Mácha that Doctor Cz. gave me, and every photocopy that she had in her office on E. F. Burian. To give you an idea of the scope of that last item, Doctor Cz. is a specialist in Czech drama and theatre of the 1930s who has been at it for a long time and is currently working on the links between Alfred Radok's superb Holocaust movie, The Long Journey and Burian's productions of May.

My brain is also full for the moment. I was naive when I started writing my dissertation, but at the same time worried. How could I possibly write fifty pages on Burian's productions of May? I am someone who has a problem writing a twenty-page paper. As the topic spirals to include larger swathes of culture, history, and theatre, I'm beginning to wonder how I'll manage with only fifty pages. Here's the stuff Doctor Cz. and I have decided I need to look at (the list is more for me at this point, but enjoy it anyway):

Levý on translation

Everything on Brecht's Three-Penny Opera on which I can lay hands.

Either Tynianov or Shklovskii on adaptations of Gogol's "The Overcoat." Both Doctor Cz. and I forgot exactly who wrote it.

A volume of Poetics Today from 1981. I don't remember why.

Anything on the German Dramatizerung, which I probably just spelled incorrectly. This will prove to be a problem during my database searches.

Find out when the first adaptations/dramatizations of poetry and prose occurred in the Czech context.

Find everything I can on Kundera's dramatization of Diderot's Jacques the Fatalist and his Master. (I've linked to Powell's because it is a really, really good book.)

Find everything I can on everyone's dramatization of Hašek's Good Soldier Svejk, whose last name merits a diacritic that I am unable to program at the moment.

Check out Burian's production of Nezval's Manon Lescaut because it's a dramatization too.

Look at Meierkhol'd's collaborations with Eisenstein.

Look at Meierkhol'd in general.

Read Szondi's book on lyrical drama. It's in German. Eep.

And I know that this is only the beginning. There are quite a few people out there who are more than willing to discuss the hard slog that is a dissertation, but they always seem to forget about the joy involved. This thing is beginning to look like more and more fun as time progresses. -Zh.