Yeah, I mean this is about avoiding infirmity and torturous physical agony, in era void of modern painkillers no the less. So even otherwise happy people might by inclined to take this route. Testament to desperation all the same. And like... Really. Ďuro. Hasn't he been through enough already? Apparently not.
And it is also a wonderful glimpse into his character!
Arguably here he expresses remarkable distance from christian dogma. He can't exactly bring himself on board no matter how often he hears it everywhere around himself.
But that is its own can of worms that nowadays non-religious don't have to deal with as much. Less immerssion, less pressure to conform and participate, more different perspectives available. These days one knows one is not alone in their views. These days one might grow up totally unexposed to it.
The sneaky doubt "but what if" is way less intense. The depressive "if I am not wrong, but right, then this whole world is atrociously delusional". The alienating "and they would kill me for it, even those who want to be friends with me".
Not all (e.g. Barbarič), but he perceives hostility much more readily than kindness and in all fairness those more tolerant would be pressured to abandon him if he ever brought enmity of authorities on himself.
And so he lives with shadow of damnation looming over him. For already being on thin ice with livelyhood he inherited and livelyhood he signed up for later due to lack of other options, for dropping a cannonball on that ice with fascination/enjoyment he can't turn off, for what he's done on that fateful night in Prague, for his inabiliy to believe, for questions like why Lazarus didn't say anything about afterlife, for temptation to end it all.
There is ambivalence about it and I think Ďuro managed to land on it pretty ok.
When told he's going to hell by a robber in Les prízrakov, another robber in Lovec čertov and also Stein in Pre hrsť dukátov, Jaroš agrees.
Does it mean he merely thinks he deserves it, or that he regularly experiences moments when he is more convinced of realness of hell and moments, when he is less convinced?
Or did events of Anjel v posvetí and hellish dreams during his post-surgical coma push him towards greater acceptance of devils and eternal punishment?
When he reflects on how much he savours watching people sin and that he feels as if he was collecting souls for hell in Pre hrsť dukátov, it is unclear whether he regards that as mere fancy not grounded in reality, or actually is inclined to believe he might be a vessel for/be merged with somehing demonic.
He seems to regard ghosts as serious phenomena both during his sickness in Anjel v podsvetí ("they sound different than this scream", "what did your deceased son tell you, when he visited") and later in Prekliata kniha ("can't think of anything else that would resemble the sound, there are inexplicable things"). Unless he was messing with his coworkers in Prekliata kniha. He has developed a penchant for that.
He has also complicated relationship with conscience, which is rather unhelpful next to christian focus on repentance.
Born in the wrong century, this guy, born in the tremendously wrong century.
EDIT - DAMN, IT TOOK A SINGLE LOOK AT TAGS IN ENGLISH FOR ME TO SWITCH LANGUAGES AND WRITE THIS IN ENGLISH WITHOUT SKIPPING A BEAT.
I AM NOT REWRITING IT IN SLOVAK. JUST NO. IT STAYS LIKE THIS.
