Abstract

The poem To the Poet represents one of the pinnacles of Prešeren's artistic expression, however, numerous interpreters had difficulties with its extreme pessimism. In accordance with the belief that one should first and foremost recognise “the sharp-sighted eagle” in the first national poet, interpreters tried to revaluate this pessimism with the cult of poetic mission. Empirical reception test demonstrated that the structure of the poem actually enables diverse, even completely illogical understandings of rhetorical questions, most probably on account of psychological influence of negation.

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