Top 10 Czech Books You Can Read in English


 

 

The topic of Czech literature is quite funny and complicated in the same time. We are speaking of a culture that was persecuted over the centuries, facing a great influence of German language especially during the time of the Austro-Hungarian Empire and the rule of the Habsburg dynasty. It is a little miracle that our language was preserved, not being entirely replaced by German.

Czech language is still alive!

The Czech language was saved in the 18th and in the 19th century, when some of the Czech intellectuals started to publish Czech dictionaries and Czech books. Like this, the language and culture became slowly more and more respected at least among the scientific circles.

This article is dedicated to all book lovers. Photo sourced from piqsels.com.

After the fall of the Austro-Hungarian Empire in 1918, the official language in our country became Czechoslovak, even though there is no such language, there are only Czech and Slovak languages. Later on, Czech and Slovak were adapted as two official languages of the country but were not the only languages to be spoken in former Czechoslovakia… but in the streets, you could have heard also German, Yiddish, and even Hungarian or Ukrainian. Since the former Bohemia and the Czechoslovak Republic formed a multinational state, the borders between the cultures, if there were any, seem actually rather thin.

So, what is the Czech literature like?

It is not easy to describe Czech literature as a whole. Still, one of the main influences could be persecution from the authorities and a critique of bureaucracy. In the 20th century, a vast majority of writers was influenced by either one of the wars, or by the Soviet occupation. This means that the literature tended to be divided into three streams – firstly, into the official one, glorifying the regime, secondly, into the exile one, to which contributed the émigrés who fled the country, and thirdly, the unofficial, dissident, “underground” stream of those, who remained in Czechoslovakia and published their works secretly. The same situation was occurring throughout the history even in the past centuries, when the main problem concerned religions.

And what should I read?

As for our list, there is one thing we should all remember – whenever it comes to choosing the best of the best, there is a certitude we should be sure about – the best does not exist. For example, the only Czech holder of the Nobel Prize in Literature is not mentioned in the list below. That, of course, does not mean that his poems are not worth reading. They certainly are! (By the way, his name is Jaroslav Seifert, and he was awarded the Nobel Prize in 1984). But still, the list is based on my personal preference only.

Czech books would make a great souvenir from Prague. So, if you are searching for these English translations, you could buy a copy in some of the English-friendly bookshops, such as Shakespeare a synové (Shakespeare and Sons) that you could find in the Malá Strana district.

Shakespeare and Sons Bookshop. Address: U Lužického semináře 10, Praha 1. Opened every day from 11 to 19. Photo sourced from Flickr, author: Chris Shervey

1. The Cremator by Ladislav Fuks (1923–1994)

As you can possibly figure out, this author had a though life. When he was a child, the second world war started, and once he turned a bit older, the Nazis were replaced by the Communists.

During the WW2, Ladislav Fuks compassioned a lot with his Jewish schoolmates affected by the “new order”. His empathy was actually caused by the fact, that Fuks himself was a homosexual and tried to hide his sexual orientation during his life, despite not being very successful. In order to emigrate, he even married an Italian woman, but ran away with a Romanian waiter straight after the ceremony… But enough with these sensationalist juicy facts!

The first book se speak about is actually set in a crematorium… Photo sourced from Pixabay, author: Anemone123.

The topic of the WW2 emerged in Fuks’s literary works notably in The Cremator (Spalovač mrtvol, 1967), known also for a later movie of the same name. This novel speaks about a man who works in a crematorium and becomes unhealthily obsessed by the idea of the “pure race”. Surely, not the most optimistic topic to speak about, on the other hand, the way Fuks narrates his plots is extremely catchy and dreamlike in the same time.

2. The Joke by Milan Kundera (born 1929)

Trust me, Milan Kundera is still appreciated by his Czechs. But he does not seem to be concerned. Milan Kundera was born in that-time Czechoslovakia, however, since his emigration to Paris in the mid-1970’s, Kundera perceives himself as a French writer. A few years upon his arrival, he even learned to write in the language of Moliere.

Still, there is a small pile of books that he published before he left the country, and these novels could be considered as Czech. For example, The Joke (Žert, 1967). In this book, Kundera expresses openly his critique towards the totalitarian era of Czechoslovakia and towards the censorship. The book had a chance to be published before the  Red Army occupation in August 1968 but was later forbidden to be printed until the fall of communism in 1989.

Milan Kundera, today French writer, was actually born in Czechoslovakia. Photo sourced from WikimediaCommons.

There are also other novels Kundera would originally write in Czech but would published them abroad . Yet, they would still make  a great testimony of what was happening in Czechoslovakia after the Soviet occupation. If you are attracted by this subject, you should go for The Unbearable Lightness of Being (Nesnesitelná lehkost bytí, 1984). Do not get scared by the rather philosophical title! It indeed is a  witty book with a lot of deep thoughts, but it’s also extremely reader-friendly and provides a great introspection into the everyday life of Czechoslovak intellectuals who either emigrated abroad or stayed in the totalitarian city of Prague.

3. Angel Station by Jáchym Topol (born 1962)

Topol is an author who experienced the persecution of the communist totalitarian regime as a young boy, and started to publish his novels after 1989, when the totalitarian times were gone. His writing style is rather expressive, documenting the speech that you can easily overhear on the streets of Prague, or even underneath them – in the metro stations.

Jáchym Topol in 2010. Photo sourced from WikimediaCommons.

Among his translated novels, we could thus name Angel Station (Anděl, 1995). This fiction retells the ballad of Smíchov – one of the Prague districts. Topol openly speaks about drugs and filthy life that was inseparably connected to the society that used to live in Smíchov in the early 1990’s. By the way, even though Prague faces the process of gentrification, maybe you could still find some of the bars or places that untouched since this time…

4. From the Interior by Petr Borkovec (born 1970)

If you are a poetry lover, and you do not insist on reading alexandrines solely, you should try the poetry anthology From the Interior (Vnitrozemí, 2005) consisting of several books by the Czech contemporary poet Petr Borkovec. He is one of the most known Czech authors, respected not only for his cultivated way of composing his poetry, but also for the poems that could definitely attract those who won’t see themselves as poetry fans.

Petr Borkovec. Photo sourced from Flickr. Author: Ondřej Lipár.

5. The Tremor of Racehorses By Sylva Fischerová (born 1963)

Yet another poetry collection. This one was published in 1986, when the young poetess, Sylva, was only 22 years old and studied at the Charles University in Prague.

Sylva Fischerová is an extremely educated woman, a professor of Ancient Greek and Latin that you would wish to have for a teacher. That also means that her poems are probably not the easiest ones, but the more you will try to understand them, the more you will appreciate them.

Sylva Fischerová. Photo sourced from Flickr, author: Ondřej Lipár.

6. Description of the Struggle by Franz Kafka (1884 – 1924)

Franz Kafka and his relation to Prague would indeed cover a long article on its own, and still, only one article would not clarify anything anyway. Simply – Kafka was born in a Jewish, German-speaking family, attended a Catholic school at the Old Town Square of Prague, and spoke and read in Czech and other languages. There is no doubt that the city of Prague influenced his way of writing and even thinking, too. During his life, he liven in several places in the city, for a short period of time even up at the Castle, in the Golden Lane.

Kafka’s house in Golden Lane, Prague Castle. Photo sourced from WikimediaCommons, author: Øyvind Holmstad.

But, to be honest, Kafka never published anything in the Czech language – or, more precisely, he never tended to publish anything at all, since the majority of his works was published by his friend posthumously.

Franz Kafka himself. Photo sourced from WikimediaCommons. Source: National Library of Israel.

Description of a Struggle (Beschreibung eines Kampfes, 1912) is Kafka’s early short story that he wrote prior to The Trial or The Metamorphosis. I mention it especially because the story takes place in Prague, prominently on the Petřín Hill, the one with the little copy of Eiffel Tower.

7. Cutting It Short by Bohumil Hrabal

Now we can admire the beauties of the Czech language. One word only – Postřižiny – must be translated in other languages as a three-words-expression and even like that the meaning won’t be the same as in the original…

Bohumil Hrabal was a beloved personality in the former Czechoslovakia, author of many stories and novels and a great cat lover. During the communist time, he belonged to the “official literary stream” and never emigrated abroad. That didn’t mean that he was a collaborator of the totalitarian regime. He was able to write his stories and a way that was not offensive to the political repression but was still readable to the society.

Bohumil Hrabal’s wall in Prague – Libeň. Photo sourced from WikimediaCommons, author: Mohylek.

Many of Hrabal’s novels were later adapted in movies, which is also the case of Postřižiny. This story takes place in a Czech city of Nymburk, in a brewery, and has a rather relaxing impact on the reader. Summer, beer and Czech nature – what more shall you need?

8. R. U. R. by Karel Čapek

Have you ever asked yourself: “Where does the word ‘robot’ actually come from”? Well, if you have, or even if you haven’t, this book is certainly the right one for you. It is actually a theatre play, it dates back to the 1920’s, to the era of literary dystopia that we know from Aldous Huxley and many other writers. In the play, Čapek introduces android-like creatures that he calls robots, and the title, R.U.R, stands for Rossum’s Universal Robots. The word is derived from a Slavic word robota. In the Czech language, it had the meaning of corvée, hard labor… and you can find robota in slightly different meanings also in Russian, Macedonian, Bulgarian or Slovak.

Karel Čapek’s dog, a fox terrier girl named Dášenka (Daschenka). Sourced from Wikimedia Commons.

This science-fiction drama was translated into many foreign languages and was performed on the stages of multiple theaters around the world.

The sci-fi novelist Isaac Asimov considered Čapek’s play as actually very bad, claiming that it remained famous just because of the new invented word, but I think that you should create your own opinion when you actually get to know R. U. R on your own.

9. The Garden Party by Václav Havel

Václav Havel is known primarily as the former president of the independent Czechoslovakia and, after 1993, of the Czech Republic. During the communist time, Havel was a persecuted dissident, and couldn’t have published his works unless using a pseudonym. The Garden Party (Zahradní slavnost, 1963) is Havel’s contribution to the absurd drama genre known certainly thanks to the works of Samuel Beckett or Eugene Ionesco.

Václav Havel in 1965. Sourced from WikimediaCommons, author: Jaroslav Krejčí.

The protagonists of Havel’s The Garden Party speak in a rather bizarre, platitudinal manner, using only clichés with no real meaning. Havel’s dramatic piece is an actual image of the incoming totalitarianism and bureaucracy.

10. Valerie and Her Week of Wonders by Vítězslav Nezval

Nezval was a poet and a writer who represented multiple literary genres – beginning as an avant-gardist and an experimenter, he also wrote a collection of classical sonnets in the same time. In the 1950’s, however, he started to support the communist regime and manifested his devotion in his works that no-one really reads nowadays.

On the other hand, his Valerie and Her Week of Wonders (1946), a short novel published before his ideological shift, is an amazing masterpiece. Working on his book, Nezval was influenced by surrealism and  by the black Gothic novel, which was popular genre in Czechoslovakia of that time. In Valerie, he decided to mix both of his inspiration sources, creating a dreamlike story of Valeria, a young girl living with her grandmother and experiencing rather strange events…

A scene from the movie Valerie and Her Week of Wonders. Sourced from Flickr, author: Narcis Bianco.

No wonder that Valerie and Her Week of Wonders could slightly remind of Alice in Wonderland.

By the way, Nezval’s novel was adapted into a movie in the 1960’s. I would strongly recommend this film – you can find it on DVD in English or even in other languages. The costumes and the decorations of the scenes are just speechless and Valerie is breathtakingly beautiful.

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