Line #6 Creator/JaraCimrman


1	[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/mov___cimrman.jpg]]
2	[[caption-width-right:350:On 8th May 1915 in the town of Míšov, the world‑renowned Czech genius Jára Cimrman passed by narrowly.]]
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5	%% DO NOT point out the character is fictional, or that he "allegedly" did something. That's against the whole point of the character! Once at the END of the introduction is enough.
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7	->''"The world greatest writer, inventor, painter, physicist, [[ArsonMurderAndJaywalking skier]] and philosopher of the last century is Jára Cimrman. We may disagree with this statement, we may argue about it, but all in all that is all we can do about it."''
8	-->--Unknown author.
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10	Despite being virtually unknown abroad, [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jára_Cimrman Jára Cimrman]]'s spirit looms large over Czech culture and popular consciousness. Born in Vienna,[[note]]which is in Austria and has always been in Austria[[/note]] he was the quintessential entrepreneurial, creative and hopelessly unsuccessful Czech underdog of the late Hapsburg period.
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12	He was last seen in first months of [[UsefulNotes/WorldWarI WW1]] in village Liptákov. Afterward, in spite of his massive range of achievements, his work and himself has been forgotten for almost fifty years. And then a miracle happened. On 23[-rd-] Februrary in 10:05 around 1966 [[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karel_Velebn%C3%BD Dr. Evžen Hedvábný]] and his direct cousin [[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zden%C4%9Bk_Sv%C4%9Br%C3%A1k Dr. Zdeněk Svěrák]] together rediscovered Cimmrman's work. And the rest his history.
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14	He was an inventor, a writer, a playwright, a composer, a criminologist, and many other things. He also would have won the "Greatest Czech" poll held by the Czech TV in 2005 (following a template from the BBC), were it not for the perfectly negligible technicality that he is completely and utterly fictional.
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16	%%!!Notable works featuring Jára Cimrman:
17	%% * Theatre/TheConquestOfTheNorthPole
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19	!!Tropes that may apply to Jára Cimrman:
20	* Main/BeenThereShapedHistory: Jára Cimrman is the epitome of this trope. Amongst many, MANY things – he created the light bulb, brought rabbits to Australia, advised [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dmitri_Mendeleev Mendeleev]] to rotate his draft of the Periodic Table of Elements, suggested adding a sister to the [[Creator/AntonChekhov Checkhov]]'s play ''[[Theatre/ThreeSisters Two Sisters]]'' and even invented the Internet itself (started as a telephone info-booth with a group of teachers inside, one of them being a stuttering man ''W-W-W.Weber''). Oh yes, and he also invented the light bulb, dynamite, etc. (but arrived at the patent office a minute after Edison and Nobel, respectively).
21	* CreatorBacklash: Cimmrman's one act play ''Akt''[[labelnote:Translation]]Nude[[/labelnote]] was played only once but it was received so badly that Cimrman later wrote message for future:
22	-> Whoever might attempt to recreate this artistic piece of mine, be as critical as you like. I will not mind if you alter any dialogue, characters or entire plot. My point is the message and that have to stay.
23	* TheFaceless: Cimrman opposed being phptographed as "individual concept" because he considered himself to be "part of all mankind" which leads to few known photos being taken from far distance in a group of people. So any known photos usually looks like [[https://www.alamy.com/c1890s-germany-the-brandenburg-gate-berlin-image560809040.html this]]
24	** Another known depiction of Cimrman is the [[https://cs.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/J%C3%A1ra_Cimrman#/media/File%3ACimrman_autobusta.jpg bust]] created by the man himself. Which unfortunately suffered a lot of damage since it's creation.
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26	* TheGhost: Cimrman used this trope as a way to deal with a lack of actresses and actors in general. He was good at implementing this that he was capable of producing such plays as ''[[Theatre/ThreeSisters One Sister ]],'' ''[[Literature/AliBabaAndTheFortyThieves Ali Baba Alone ]]'' and ''[[{{Theatre/Hamlet}} Hamlet without Hamlet ]]''
27	-->'''Gertrude:''' Terrible news! Hamlet is hiding again!
28	-->'''Claudius:''' Pity, I wanted to ask him
29	-->''"How is it that the clouds still hang on you?"''
30	-->But I already know what he would say
31	-->''"Not so, my lord; I am too much i' the sun"''
32	-->'''Gertrude:''' Yes that's so typical for him. And you know what I would say?
33	-->''"Good Hamlet, cast thy nighted colour off,''
34	-->''And let thine eye look like a friend on Denmark.''
35	-->''Do not for ever with thy vailed lids''
36	-->''Seek for thy noble father in the dust:''
37	-->''Thou know'st 'tis common; all that lives must die,''
38	-->''Passing through nature to eternity. "''
39	* GratuitousForeignLanguage: Gratuitous Hungarian. In ''Vražda v salonním kupé'' [[note]] "Murder in the Salon Compartment"[[/note]] , with a Hungarian train steward whose dialogue features a few actual Hungarian words that make no sense in context. That is because Cimrman knew no Hungarian and had only two materials in Hungarian at hand when writing the play: the menu of the Hotel Petőfi, and the Hungarian railway timetable.
40	* MissingEpisode: Compared to Cimmrman's enormous range of plays only a hanful of them survived. The most infamous cases being:
41	** Seven hours long operetta ''Proso'' [[labelnote:Translation]]Panicgrass[[/labelnote]] which is believed to be divided among works of several austrian, hungarian and czech composers [[note]]like Oskar Nedbal, Emerich Kalmán, Oskar Nedbal etc.[[/note]]
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43	** [[Main/ZigZaggingTrope Zig-Zagged]] with a play ''Němý Bobeš'' [[labelnote: Translation]]Mute Bobeš[[/labelnote]] as while we know the basic structure most of what we know about the play comes from outside sources such as reviews and straight up speculations. Which lead to individual productions being [[BroadStrokes completely different while coming from the same assumptions]]
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45	** Cimmrman himself has become such after the beggining of [[UsefulNotes/WorldWarI WW1]]. After his last known appereance all of his work has come from obscurity and was completely forgotten for years until he was rediscovered again.
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47	* RaisedAsTheOppositeGender: He was forced to wear girl's clothes as a child, and didn't find out he was a boy until age 15.
48	* RhymingWithItself: One of the plays of Jára Cimrman Theatre in Prague contains a poem that is ALL this, containing "rhymes" like "Our old clock beats four o'clock". Jára Cimrman apparently believed that a rhyme must repeat the whole word in order to be considered perfect. Though it is believed by many scholars that it's still not a perfect solution, since the perfection of the rhyme is at the cost of "certain diminishment of the meaning".
49	* {{UsefulNotes/Solipsism}}: Inverted. Cimrman's philosophical work is put together around the idea of Externism. As Cimrman put it "Only outside world exists. There is no 'I'." You're probably thinking "How could the non-existent mind create a philosophy?" Very easily actually because " not existing" does not mean "not being relevant." Imagine world like a rug with a hole.[[note]]Non-existing Cimrman[[/note]] When you stretch it so does the hole. Hole is affected, Hole is relevant. And so is the Cimrman. [[LeaningOnTheFourthWall This is how non-existent Cimrman could create a philosophy of his own.]]
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Context Creator / JaraCimrman