Czech writers available in English

Beginning this month, Expats.cz is going to introduce you to Czech writers whose work is available in English. To start out, we wanted to give you a brief overview of Czech writers in general. “Brief” is quite impossible, however, because not surprisingly there are many, many Czech writers. We narrowed the focus by choosing “newer” writers (those who wrote in the 20th century) and those who have at least a couple titles translated into English. Links correspond to the book on Amazon. If you are looking to explore further, stop in to Big Ben Bookstore. Their staff is quite knowledgeable about Czech writers and can find for you authors whose work is available in English. Penguin Classics also has a Central European Classics imprint which showcases ten books from Central European authors. This month we reviewed How I Came to Know Fish by Ota Pavel.

How I Came to Know Fish is a sweet memoir about a man´s remembrances of his father. The chapters are short and each one simply relates an incident, sometimes involving the author, often just a story about his father. There isn´t really any story development, just a lovely string of memories. The stories are set right before the outbreak of World War II and then into World War II. Pavel´s father is Jewish, his mother, Christian and his father and two older brothers were sent to concentration camps. All miraculously returned alive.

The slim book could be completed in a few hours and is modest in its tone and content. Pavel shares poignant stories like the time, after the Nazis invaded, that he and his father stole fish from their own pond. One of Electrolux´s best vacuum cleaner salesmen, “Papa” was at once both a schemer and a charmer and many of the stories revolve around his escapades. The sentiments that come though are of a man who loves his family, and a boy who, at least at the beginning, had an idyllic childhood.