GENRE ORIGINALITY OF NOVEL “WAR WITH THE SALAMANDERS” BY KAREL ČAPEK

The article is devoted to the genre originality of the novel “War with the Salamanders” by Czechwriter Karel Čapek (1936). Its goal is to analyse the author`s precept to unite artistic possibilitiesconnected with various genre modifications of the novel: from Renaissance to postmodern traditions.Synthetic and polyphonic novel form, created by Karel Čapek in the process of artistic experiment, isbased on using various discursive practices: folklore (animal tale), philosophical (Socratic dialogue,academic dispute, treatise, report), journalistic and popular science (newspaper and magazinearticle), colloquially-everyday (dialogues between the representatives of different cultural, social,gender, age groups) and others. All of them are united due to the parody-satirical re-creation withinthe borders of author’s intention, subordinate to the task to emphasize the deviation of the modernindividual and mass consciousness from the humanistic norm. Based on the different traditionsthat determine the evolution of the European novel, Karel Čapek follows the gradual changes thathappened to the “European humanity” in the process of moving from the New to the Newest time.The author artistically diagnoses the reasons for the transition from the gradual development of cultureto the rapid take-off of civilization, from anthropocentric personal thinking to mass intellectualspeculation, pragmatically oriented towards disguising a cannibalistic pursuit of success and profit.Especially important in this regard are the developments of the adventurous, socio-psychologicaland social, family, fantasy, satirical, anti-utopian, intellectual and philosophical novels, which aretransformed in the context of the parable created by Chápek about man and humanity, outlining andat the same time denying the postmodern appeal to the whole preliminary development of literatureby the seriousness of the game initiated by the author.