A special guest of the festival is Jaromír 99.At this year’s international comics festival in Munich, Comicfestival München 2023, seven Czech artists will present their works. The events and exhibitions have been jointly organised and prepared by the Czech Literary Centre, Czech Centre in Munich, and Comicfestivals München 2023.

A special guest of the festival is Jaromír 99, whose graphic novel Čáslavská, written by Jan Novák and translated by Mirko Kraetsch, will be published by Salleckpublications this year. On 6 June, the author will take part in the launch of the Off Season exhibition, presenting his works inspired by the Czech landscape. He will also accompany, together with Dušan Neuwerth, the launch by music. The audience will have the opportunity to see the exhibition by Jaromír 99 in the rooms of the Czech Centre in Munich until 14 July 2023. The visitors will also be able to see the Alois Nebel film at the end of the festival.

In addition to Jaromír 99, younger generations of Czech comic artists will also take part in the festival. The exhibition titled In the Gutter will present works by Monika Baudišová, Štepánka Jislová, Tomáš Kučerovský, Vojtěch Mašek, and Lenka Šimečková. You can visit the exhibition in the rooms of the cult café Kosmos in the centre of the city from 7 June to 14 July 2023. The artists have also created strips that will be exhibited in the neighbouring restaurant Bufet. Czech artists will also take part in debates at the comics festival.

On Friday, 9 June, Marek Toman will present The Expelled Children comics, the translation of which (by Raija Hauck) has been published by the publisher Balaena this year. Five artists in total have participated in the book – Jakub Bachorík, Magdalena Rutová, Stanislav Setinský, František Loubat, and Jindřich Janíček. Comics from The Expelled Children book will be exhibited in the rooms of the Sudetendeutsches Haus (Sudeten German House) throughout this June; the exhibition has been prepared by Balaena in cooperation with Adalbert Stifter Verein.

The conference will be held on September 30.To coincide with International Translation Day and as part of the Czech Presidency of the EU Council, the Czech Literary Centre is organising an online conference to provide Czech and foreign literary translators with inspiration and examples of good practice from other countries.

The core of the conference consists of two discussion blocks: the first will focus on the translator as a literary intermediary and the possible merging of translation with other professions; the second will be devoted to associations of translators as platforms for sharing expertise and fighting for fair conditions.

In the early evening, the online conference will be followed by a literary panel at the Václav Havel Library where the writer Radka Denemarková and the renowned German translator Eva Profousová will discuss the importance of literary translation but also Radka Denemarková’s novel Hours of Lead (2018), the German edition of which earned the two of them the 2022 Brücke Berlin Literature and Translation Prize. The event will be chaired by Dana Pfeiferová.

The conference program can be found HERE.

An invitation to a diverse programme at the Professional ForumFor this year’s Book World Prague (9–12 June), the Czech Literary Centre (CLC), a part of the Moravian Library, has again arranged a diverse programme for the Professional Forum and the Large Hall, aimed at publishers (on Thursday and Saturday), translators (on Friday) and readers (on Sunday).

“We were inspired by two things – by Italy, which is the fair’s guest of honour, and by our focus this year on the support of work by translators, expanding readers’ horizons,” explained Martin Krafl, the head of the Czech Literary Centre.

On the first day of the largest Czech book fair, the CLC has organized a breakfast to bring together Czech, Ukrainian, German and Italian publishers. “We want these publishers to get to know each other and then hopefully collaborate in the future,” said Michala Čičváková, the CLC coordinator for international cooperation. On Saturday the specialist programme for publishing firms continues with discussions and lectures on the theme of the book market for large and small publishers. The discussion on the theme “Czech Literature on Its Way into the World” is one of Saturday’s highlights, where Martin Janeček will hold a discussion with Alessandro De Vito and Julia Różewicz, whose publishing houses have special editions focusing entirely on Czech literature. The event will be hosted by Tomáš Kubíček.

On Friday the CLC’s programme will focus on translators: “We see them as the most important link between the author, the publisher and the reader. It is thanks to them that Czech writers and their books make their way into the wider world,” said Čičváková. Publishers and other professionals from the book trade can choose from lectures on mentoring, grant support and translating in teams or in pairs. The best translations are often the result of the joint efforts of people who are couples both in their professional and sometimes also in their private lives. Júlia Sherwood, Peter Sherwood, Stephan Delbos and Tereza Novická will discuss their own experiences at an event hosted by Mike Baugh. Alice Flemrová and recipient of the Magnesia Litera Award for Book Translation, Michala Benešová, will discuss their experiences mentoring new translators as part of the CELA (Connecting Emerging Literary Artists) international project.

There will also feature debates with authors aimed at the wider public. On Sunday, young European authors will examine the influence of places and historical situations on our identity and self-narrative. Afterwards, Italian and Czech writers will look at the relationship between books and films, in particular literary adaptations.

The Czech Literary Centre programme for the Professional Forum can be found either below or be downloaded HERE.

A special edition of the Belgian comic-strip magazine Stripgids is just coming out, focusing on the Czech scene.Belgium is the Mecca of comic strips, yet Czech comics have not yet been systematically presented there. That is set to change this summer. A special edition of the Belgian comic-strip magazine Stripgids is just coming out, focusing on the Czech scene and presenting Lucie Lomová, Vojtěch Mašek, ToyBox, Jaromír 99 and others. It will be followed up by an overview exhibition of Czech artists at the Brussels Comic Strip Festival.

“Belgium is the land of Tintin and the Smurfs and the locals are rightly proud of this. We are delighted that, together with Stripgids, we can show that Czech comics are also definitely worthy of attention,” says the director of the Czech Centre Brussels, Jitka Pánek Jurková.

For many people, Stripgids is the most beautiful comic-strip magazine of the Benelux Union. Its spring issue was compiled by the Czech comics historian Pavel Kořínek and presents a portfolio of twelve of the most distinctive young faces of Czech comic-strip art, including examples of their work. It will be presented on 12th June at the Muntpunt library in Brussels.

“Czech comics have probably never had it so good, at least as regards the variety, creativity and ambition of the published works,” says Pavel Kořínek. “They are characterised by self-confidence, an infectious enthusiasm and the desire to tell stories and experiment.” Pavel Kořínek’s talk in Brussels will be accompanied by live animation inspired by Czech comic strips, the work of the famous Flemish comics artist and author Charel Cambré.

In collaboration with the Czech Centre Rotterdam Stripgids will also be presented in Amsterdam on 11th June 2019, at Boycott Books. Pavel Kořínek and Charel Cambré will also appear there. However, viewers can also look forward to the official launch of the Dutch translation of the book Podivuhodná robotí expedice (The Remarkable Robot Expedition, 2016), attended by the author, Jindřich Janíček.

“We would also like to present Czech comics in the neighbouring Netherlands, although the scene there is not as lively as in Belgium. We have successfully contacted the bookshop and publishing house Boycott Books, which publishes artistically interesting books in Dutch, including Czech books,” adds Hana Schenková from the Czech Centre Rotterdam.

Then, in September, the Brussels Comic Strip Festival will feature an exhibition entitled Mezitím na jiném místě (Meanwhile, Elsewhere), charting the history of Czech comics.

Presentation of Stripgids no. 5:

11 June 2019 19:00, Boycott Books, Amsterdam – https://boycottbooks.com/11-06-presentation-of-stripgids-5-boycott-book-launch/
12 June 19:30 Muntpunt, Brussels – https://www.facebook.com/events/1095133380670785/

We cordially invite you to events organized by the Czech Literary Centre at Book World Prague 2019, which takes place at the Výstaviště exhibition grounds in Prague on 9–12 May 2019.The Czech Literary Centre, a section of the Moravian Library, in cooperation with other institutions, has prepared a rich discussion programme for visitors from the expert, professional and general public. The institutions the Czech Literary Centre cooperates with include the Polish Institute, Instytut książki, the Translators’ Guild, the Karolinum Publishing House and Book World. The Professional Forum enjoyed great interest from the public last year.

On Thursday, 9 May, you can have breakfast during a presentation of books from the Ibero-American region, listen to a lecture on e-shops or a panel discussion of literary agents. In the afternoon, you can attend a discussion on the results of the Leipzig Fair and in the evening there is speed dating with publishers for translators from Spanish and Portuguese.

On Friday, there is a networking breakfast for invited local and foreign publishers, and after lunch a series of lectures and workshops focusing not only on children’s reading and its support. You can also attend a literary-sociological lecture by Grzegorz Jankowicz, programme director of the Krakow literary festival Conrad. The programme ends with another speed dating session for translators with publishers.

On Saturday, there will be events with the UK guests of the Czech Literary Centre, Paul Gravett, focusing on the comic book scene, and Alexandra Büchler, who will talk about British book culture in the Brexit era. This time, booktubers and influencers will hold discussions with translators. Czech samizdat literature in translations will be discussed by translator Gerald Turner with Martin Machovec and Adéla Petruželková.

On Sunday, the Professional Forum programme will be completed with a Polish breakfast: an introduction to the main guest of Book World Prague 2020 – Poland.

A detailed programme of the Professional Forum can be found in the attachment.

Authors Jaroslav Rudiš, Petr Stančík, Milena Slavická, Jiří Dvořák and Jiří Padevět will present their latest books. The Czech stand, organised by the Czech Ministry of Culture and the Moravian Library in Brno, will be in hall 4. The stand’s architecture will be based on Czech functionalism and will feature the newest award-winning Czech books, including the winners of the Golden Ribbon award for children’s literature. Czech authors will also take part in a number of events in the Leipzig liest programme. Jaroslav Rudiš, whose Národní třída (National Avenue) was recently published in German, Petr Stančík, Milena Slavická, Jiří Dvořák and Jiří Padevět will read and discuss their latest books.

The complete list of Czech events in German can be found on our German blog here.

Alex Zucker will be discussing his new translation, Midway Upon the Journey of Our Life by Josef Jedlička, on 14 April.Written between 1954 and 1957 and treating events from the Stalinist era of Czechoslovakia’s postwar Communist regime, Midway Upon the Journey of Our Life flew in the face of the reigning aesthetic of socialist realism, an anti-heroic novel informed by the literary theory of Viktor Shklovsky and constructed from episodes and lyrical sketches of the author and his neighbors’ everyday life in industrial north Bohemia, set against a backdrop of historical and cultural upheaval. Due to its critical view of socialist society, Midway remained unpublished until 1966, amid the easing of cultural control, but a complete version of this darkly comic novel did not appear in Czech until 1994.

Alex Zucker’s recent translations include Heda Margolius Kovály’s Innocence; or, Murder on Steep Street, Jáchym Topol’s The Devil’s Workshop (Winner of the 2013 English PEN Award for Writing in Translation) and Petra Hůlová’s All This Belongs to Me (Winner of the 2010 American Literary Translators Association National Translation Award).

Rajendra Chitnis, senior lecturer in Czech, Slovak and Russian literature at University of Bristol; Owen Hatherley, author of the best-selling Landscapes of Communism; and Jana Nahodilova, deputy language director at University of Britsol will also be taking part in the discussion.

More information about the event which will take place at the London — Piccadilly branch of Waterstones can be found here.

Marie Iljašenko, Pavel Maurer and Viktor Faktor from the Czech Republic will take part in the festival which begins on 15th October.

Budapest Transfer is an interdisciplinary arts festival with its main focus on contemporary literature. This year it will take place from 15th-18th October. Each edition explores a theme through which we look at literary life in a regional and international context, which provides the backbone of a programme designed to be interesting not only for the literature enthusiast but for the general public as well. The eighth edition focuses on connections between literature and gastronomy, areas close to our hearts and stomachs.

The Czech Republic will be represented by Marie Iljašenko, a poet, editor and translator, Pavel Maurer, a well-known promoter of good food, and Viktor Faktor, the author of Švejkova kuchařka (Švejk’s cookbook) and other books about cooking. The Arts and Theatre Institue is a partner of the festival.

The main aim of the four-day event is to turn literature into an experience, as well as to acquaint the audience with creative artists and authors. Budapest Transfer provides a comprehensible channel towards present-day literature, popularizes reading as an activity, and enables meeting established authors. It puts literature in context, focusing on writing and other branches of the arts. In co-operation with various partners, the Petőfi Literary Museum (Petőfi Irodalmi Múzeum/PIM) stages round-table talks, concerts, urban walks, as well as playful treasure-hunts and a range of other programmes. New ways of presentation are sought in Budapest so as to address the potential readership of our time, for the festival establishes a dialogue between literature and the world at large. This objective is furthered by the international layout of Budapest Transfer, introducing both Hungarian and foreign creators to the broader public.

The full programme can be found here.