This study offers a revised classification of the movements involved in Teréza Nováková’s work, with specific reference to the novel Děti čistého živého (Children of Pure Living Spirit). Reference is made to the literary-historical and period metanarrative, emphasizing the presence of the ideal in the author’s work, which, however, was somewhat sidelined in the historical context, so that with the passage of time, Nováková was categorized under documentary realism. In the context of recent literary-history debates over the term ideal realism, and making use of the reception at that time, we demonstrate the stylization techniques Nováková used to construct, through her acknowledged work with oral and written documents, a text referring to the idea of nation-building based on culturally accepted paradigms.