Abstract
The paper analyzes the apocalyptic discourse of Matavulj’s short story The Last Knights (1903), as well as the ways of narrative shaping of the apocalypse, the relation of the realistic narrative to apocalyptic images and performances, and those segments in the short story that open the realistic narrative to the apocalyptic. Apocalyptic passages in the story are described and interpreted, shaped as implicit quotations to the Revelation of John the Theologian (Babylonian harlot and greenery, strongly present figure of the beast, desire for a new world and the downfall of the former one, feeling of the end of a form of existence and time, sense of doom in the existing world, personal tragedies and family ruins), while special attention is paid to the analysis of the (perverted) figure of the holy warrior, represented in the character of Ilija Bulin. At the same time, the story abounds in religious motifs and symbols: names of heroes (Elijah, James, Todor), saints (St. Francis, St. Dominic), icons, repentance, sin, which opens the possibility of a theopoetic analysis of the story itself. Although this story by Matavulj has not been included in the corpus of his pious stories so far, it can, through the abundance of hidden Christian-apocalyptic moments, quite justifiably join the given corpus.
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