Poetry in the most famous church songbooks for children and youth in the Zagreb archdiocese

Abstract

The paper analyzes verses intended for church singing and recitation in Croatian church hymnals that were specifically intended for catechesis of high school students or for the use of even younger elementary school students. The first church hymnals in recent Croatian literature with a special purpose for young people were written in the second half of the 19th century (authors: Josip Torbar - Ivan Stohl, Ante Truhelka, Šime Balenović-Franjo Šic, Ljudevit Tomšić, Đuro Šimončić, etc.), and then more and more intensively at the beginning of the 20th century (authors: Vilko Novak, Franjo Medricky, Josip Celinščak, etc.). The analysis of the poetic opus shows that earlier editions of the songbooks did not pay much attention to the special level of understanding and possibilities of perception of the adolescence age, and in these poems we still find quite a few motives of a serious penitential character, an exaggerated romantic stylistic overemphasis on emotions, and even a lot of rigor in re-examining ethical norms. The biggest turn towards the world of children’s literature was made by teacher Ante Truhelka, who adapted his texts of church songs in the middle of the 19th century to the level of children’s world and interest, and introduced into the texts features of playfulness and easy-to-remember rhyme. However, the greatest popularity achieved the manuals of the Jesuit Josip Celinščak, whose prayer book Kruh nebeski (Bread of Heaven) was published for the first time in Zagreb in 1909, and later printed in 36 editions.