In the immediate aftermath of an artist’s death, memoirs and elegiac verse begin to appear. These texts celebrate the creator’s greatness, stake a claim on their legacy, and set the legend in motion. At the same time, the intimate background of their work comes to light, along with their earliest appearances in juvenile publications. The cult then sustains itself through jubilees and death anniversaries. Ironically, some of these commemorative publications take the form of auction catalogues from the sale of artistic estates and libraries. The dispersal of Arnošt Procházka’s library was felt particularly keenly – seen as a tragic epilogue to the critic’s death, it marked the disappearance of a unique image of book culture and the intellectual atmosphere of the Decadent strand of the 1890s generation.