Such was, roughly speaking, the situation of the Slovak literature in 1989, when the velvet revolution overturned the totalitarian regime, restored the democratic mechanisms in society and introduced the market economy. This enormous change after four decades (many authors had been born under socialism) unsettled the whole of culture, all artists and writers, but at the same time it represented a challenge they needed to respond to and had to come to terms with. Actually, this process has continued to this day. Understandably, authors were enthusiastic about the fact that they could freely express themselves on everything the former regime had made taboo, and write without an ideological dictate or self-censorship. All of this found a fitting outlet in journalism and political writing, because the sphere of opinion-making became dominant for a long time. However, the new situation radically altered the status of the author (and literature) in society. Under the totalitarian regime, circumstances were simpler for the writer: either he agreed with the regime or he did not, and then he searched for a way to voice his disagreement in his literary work. Readers directly expected signs of this in every work. And the more courageous the writer (and the more liberal the stance of the regime), the greater the effect of his work. This was true of Tatarka's pamphlet Démon súhlasu (The Demon of Conformism) or Mňačko's Oneskorené reportáže (Overdue Reports). This unwritten contract between the writer and reader (at the expense of the regime) became obsolete after 1989 and it was necessary to draw up a new one, which has yet to be done.
           The fall of the old regime helped to expand the map of Slovak literature, because it now incorporated the works dissidents and of authors writing in emigration. In this way Slovak literature was enriched by several works by Dominik Tatarka, Ladislav Mňačko, Martin M. Šimečka (Vojenská knižka [The Army Papers, 1981], Výpoveď [Testimony, 1982], Žabí rok [The Year of the Frog, 1983]), Pavel Hrúz, Ivan Kadlečík, Jaroslava Blažková, and others. At the same time, the prospect of publishing further works legally opened up for some of these authors (D. Tatarka died in 1989, before the fall of Communism, L. Mňačko in 1994). Compared, for example, with the Czech Republic, the Slovak situation has its specific features in the "repatriation" of the production of authors who emigrated in 1945 (or, in some cases, in 1948) and whose personal fortunes had been closely tied with the wartime Slovak Republic and its undemocratic regime. These works reinforced nationalist and Christian tendencies in Slovakia and Slovak literature.
           The most important of these emigrés was J. C. Hronský (1896 - 1960), who was one of our most productive 20^th century writers. Starting with traditional rural stories. he developed into a modern novelist with traits of expressionism. His most important works are Chlieb (Bread, 1931), Jozef Mak, 1933, Pisár Gráč (Gráč, the Scrivener, 1940). His further novels, Andreas Búr Majster (Andreas Búr, the Master, 1948) and Svet na Trasovisku (A World in a Quagmire, 1960), were published in emigration. The former has an historic setting, but history serves only as a backdrop; the author traces the fate of a man on an existential level. The central character in the novel is a strong individual who opens himself to the world, he wants to help people, but is not accepted, being regarded as someone allied with the devil rather than with God. The latter novel is set during the war and the Slovak National Uprising. The author - a supporter of the regime of the wartime Slovak state, which collaborated with Germany - totally condemned the uprising; mainly because it was aimed against the independent state and declared the restoration of the Czecho-Slovak Republic. In contrast to his former work, in this novel Hronský "loaded" the individual characters ideologically or politically: they all represent the various ideological trends which entered into the conflicts at the time. In this sense, Svet na Trasovisku is a counterpart and at the same time the opposite of Vladimír Mináč's trilogy Generácia (Generation, 1958, 1959, 1961). Mináč not only regarded the uprising as an outbreak of discontent with fascism, but also dubbed it the first act of the socialist revolution. As already mentioned, Vincent Šikula attempted to bridge these two opposing views on an important historical event in his novels Majstri (Masters), Muškát (Geranium), and Vilma.
           The majority of authors from this wave of emigration belonged to the so-called catholic modernists (poets: Rudolf Dilong, Karol Strmeň, Koloman Geraldini and others) and their poetry was also integrated into Slovak literature after 1989. They enriched it with religious spiritualism. Of the catholic modernist poets who stayed in Slovakia after 1945, the most important is Janko Silan (1914 - 1984). As far back as 1948, he reacted critically to the communist regime, which was jailing priests and dissolving monastic orders, in verses which could only be published after the fall of communism (Piesne z Važca [Songs from Važec, 1990]). Like the other catholic modernists, Janko Silan is a poet influenced by his Christian faith, which is the ideological backdrop of his poetry. He therefore mainly protested against facts that affected the Catholic Church and therefore religion. His form of protest is also conditioned by his religion - he proclaims humility rather than revenge.
           Ján Smrek (1898 - 1982) wrote a different type of anti-regime poetry (and put it in his desk drawer). His poems of internal exile were only published in 1993 under the title Proti noci (Against the Night). They were written from the time of the "February events" of the Communist coup in 1948 until the mid 50s and provide a critical commentary on the practices of the communist regime. However, his criticism has different roots to Silan's. Smrek was a democrat by nature and rebelled against the fact that the communists liquidated democracy. From the outset, he was clearly aware that there will be no "bright tomorrows", but only dictatorship stifling any sort of free expression. Although they entered the literary process belatedly, Smrek's poetic commentaries on the social and political deformations redrew the map of post-war Slovak poetry (and literature as a whole) because they refuted the assertion that Slovak literature more or less enthusiastically converted to the socialist position after 1948. A strong and poetically convincing voice rang out here "against the night" of totality which was arriving, considered by many as a new dawn.
           The literary situation in Slovakia after 1989 was confused for a long time. Within a short time, many opposing elements appeared, producing ideological tension and exacerbating the situation of crisis. This intensified after the breakdown of mechanisms vital to the functioning of literary life: the failures of magazines, publishing houses, book distribution. From this chaotic hotbed, certain trends gradually started to emerge as themes of the new social and literary situation. We may observe the appearance of religious poetry (Milan Rúfus, Viliam Turčány, Michal Chuda), patriotically oriented prose (Ladislav Ťažký, Ivan Hudec, Peter Štrelinger, Mária Bátorová, Peter Valo and others), which also tried to revive historical myths and legends (Milan Ferko: Veľkomoravské záhady [Great Moravian Mysteries], Staré povesti slovenské [Old Slovak Legends], Nové povesti slovenské [New Slovak Legends]), works boldly breaking down sexual taboos (Ivan Kolenič: Mlčať [To Be Silent], Porušenie raja [The Breaking of Paradise]). It needs to be said that the literature with strong patriotic undertones was reinforced also by the establishment of the independent Slovak Republic in 1993. All of these trends were shown to be relatively short-lived and gradually stepped out of the limelight, or were revived (especially the nationalist theme) in journalism and were often deliberately polemic. This was also true of the themes representing coming to terms with the totalitarian past (Anton Baláž: Hijó, kone Stalinove [Giddy Up, Stalin's Horses, 1992], Tábor padlých žien [The Camp of Fallen Women, 1993]), although - as in the latter case - they were also widely read. A stronger and more lasting stream was formed by documentary prose, in which the authors described the misfeasances and crimes of communism (Rudolf Lesňák: Listy z podzemia [Letters from the Underground] and others). The fiction of this trend reached a higher level where the authors were not just taking pleasure in naturalistic descriptions of suffering, but where they also displayed the strength of man's internal conviction (Rudolf Dobiáš: Temná zeleň [Dark Green, 1996], Tajní ľudia [Secret People, 1999], Zvony a hroby [Bells and Graves, 2000]).