The author will be appearing at ten poetry eventsThe Czech Literary Centre, a section of the Moravian Library, organized and financially supported the poet Petr Hruška’s literary tour of America, where he will present his Everything Indicates: Selected Poems (Blue Diode Press, 2023, translated by Jonathan Bolton).
Petr Hruška will be reading his poetry at ten literary events across the United States. The tour begins on 19 March with a reading in Philadelphia before moving on to three appearances in New York. Afterwards, the author will visit Chicago and St. Paul, with his American journey coming to an end at the beginning of April with three events in California. He will be appearing together with American poets at most of these literary readings.
From the perspective of the Czech Literary Centre, which is active mainly in Europe, this is the second significant overseas project in quick succession. The first revolved around Czechia’s involvement as part of the European Union’s Guest of Honour appearance at the Guadalajara International Book Fair in November and December (more here). The Centre will also be looking to strengthen the promotion of Czech literature outside of Europe in the future.
The Czech Literary Centre would like to thank numerous partners for their cooperation in the organization of Petr Hruška’s tour. These include Blue Diode Press, the University of Chicago, T. G. Masaryk Czech School, Czech Center New York, the Czech and Slovak Cultural Center of Minnesota, Columbia University, the Czech Republic Ministry of Culture, and the poet Francesca Bell.
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A selection of 2023 Czech prose, poetry, children’s and YA books and comics.
]]>This illustrated educational book is notable for its humorous objectivity and highly detailed artwork. The plot centres on a “wise cephalopod” with an interest in life on dry land who is amazed at all the things humans surround themselves with.
The main character of this large-format picture book, an octopus, decides to find out more about the life of the humans who supply it with all kinds of things in the sea: plastic packaging, broken furniture, toys, defunct mobile phones, etc. It likes reading comics and books about nature and decides to write a unique book about its adventures in the world of people. Its astonishment at various human situations is genuine and, as it were, impartial, offering a fresh perspective on people’s activities on Earth. The octopus builds itself an unusual house, attends a concert and intervenes to stop xenophobic behaviour in a supermarket, and its house eventually becomes an oasis for those without a roof over their head. The elaborate large-scale illustrations feature wonderfully detailed artwork which wittily complements the tales of an octopus among humans.
Age 6+
Read an excerpt from the book here.
]]>Technology can be overwhelming with its “I need it yesterday” mindset, but the special complicity between grandads and grandsons has been with us since time immemorial. And it’s all the more indispensable in an era of harassed parents flitting between them.
The Wednesday-afternoon outings of a grandfather, Karel Kroupa, and his eight-year-old grandson with the same name previously delighted visitors to the 2020 Bologna Book Fair in It’s the Underground, Man!, with their witty dialogue and pleasingly minimalist design by Jan Šrámek and Veronika Vlková. Now their adventures continue in this exploration of the surface of Prague. The smartphone the grandfather hasn’t yet mastered, which Karel’s mother has made a prerequisite for the duo’s dream trip to visit the London underground, becomes an excuse to test the hypothesis that every technological advance had to start somewhere – even the analogue ones. And so the grey-haired adventurer and his young protégé visit flea markets, brownfields and other corners of the city where these obsolete appliances can be unearthed. Along the way, they help each other out, because no-one is born wise, mobile apps won’t always save us, and “common sense” and other “old-school” concepts don’t belong on the scrap heap. The refreshing humour and deliberate use of repetition in the story reinforce the common ground between the childhood and old age of the two Karel Kroupas. Milada Rezková’s empathetic approach breaks down the nonsensical modern-day divide between Boomers and Zoomers and demonstrates the cultivation of the male principle within the family, which is so vital for a child’s discovery of the world.
Age 7+
Read an excerpt from the book here.
]]>This declaration of love for trees and forests is also an environmental fable about the power of nature which offers a comforting yet cautionary tale. Tereza Říčanová has made a name for herself in Czech children’s literature through her distinctive style of illustrations as well as her themes, which often draw upon her own experiences of life in the country, where in addition to her artistic work she also looks after a farm and organizes workshops. This intimate story about a boy called Zbyšek in a welcoming but threatened forest is based around large-scale illustrations, with the author adopting a gentler tone than was characteristic of her work in the past.
Zbyšek and his companions – Kráska the mule and Macík the dog – initially enter the mysterious forest to shelter from the cold. The forest, which acts as another character in the story, albeit an elusive and thoroughly non-anthropomorphic one, takes them in, feeds them and lulls them to sleep. But alas, the Forest is attacked by an unstoppable steel monster, and the silence that is a song turns into an unpleasant absence of sound. However, at the point where you might expect the story to end with a depressing indictment of civilization, Říčanová is just getting started: the time has come for Zbyšek to bring life back to the forest with the help of the forest elves.
In her intensely poetic text, Tereza Říčanová conveys the wonders of the forest to young readers through all its familiar physical manifestations: smells, subtle sounds and slight movements. She presents the forest as something alive, magical and mischievous. The vertical aesthetic of the forest is successfully conveyed by the book’s elongated format.
Age 6+
Read an excerpt from the book here.
]]>The poetic title of the book Fánek the Starsailor refers to a boy’s vivid recollections of his father during a long separation. Margarita Khavanski’s dream-like illustrations help to give the story its unique atmosphere.Fánek recounts the times he spent with his dad reading a golden book about the biblical flood, around which they wove a shared fantasy of an ark floating through the starry sky. Shortly afterwards, his dad has to go far away for work, leaving him to deal with sad but ultimately routine worries about his mum and his ailing grandparents as well as new friendships. Time passes, Fánek grows up, and after his father’s unexpected return they bond with each other through a boat trip on a lake and the resurfacing of a treasured memory. Although the story is set in an unspecified time and place, it has a relevant message for contemporary readers. The Czech-Belarusian artist Margarita Khavanski has made use of various drawing techniques, and her illustrations with their soft-focus appearance and attention to detail resonate with Jana Šrámková’s unique, linguistically rich text.
Age 6+
]]>This pictorial and textual meditation on the meaning of time is based on the Einsteinian principle that our perception of time is relative. And yet each of us is faced with the challenge of making sense of it.
Subtitled By the Time You’ve Read This Sentence, 21 Children will Have Come into the World, this lavish paperback is not merely an encyclopaedia of data about the quantity which mysteriously gives everything on Earth a fourth dimension, including memory and the stamp of impermanence. There is astonishing ingenuity behind David Böhm’s conceptual approach to the illustrated reference book, which he has already successfully employed in his previous books exploring the functioning of the head, modern urban planning and the role of Antarctica in our planet’s ecosystem.
In Now Böhm introduces older school-age readers to the variable length of time and its influence on our inner selves, poses philosophical questions about its purpose and also teaches us to allow ourselves moments of meaningful boredom within that relativity, while time continues to flow steadily on, driven by laws it is not necessary – or perhaps even advisable – for us to know about. The pace at which the book examines its subject is no less dynamic. Fun facts in the style of Dorling Kindersley alternate with collages and comic strips; a section in the form of a diary is followed by a striking visual call to action – in part an ecological one, so that we will still have something to measure with our timepieces in the future.
Age 9+
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A satirical look at the world of superheroes, combining social commentary with romance and suspense
At the very start of the comics we learn that there are four ways to become a superhero: you have to be fired up with determination, not be afraid of making waves, live with the wind at your back and courage in your heart, and have adventure at your fingertips. It sounds like something from a flyer for a personal development course. What appears to be the prologue to a superhero narrative quickly transforms into an advertising slogan promoting the mysterious Supro corporation. It promises that it will help clients who sign up for its services to discover and activate their superhero gene. The desire to have special abilities is so great that many people borrow money on such unfavourable terms that they will never be able to get out of the debt trap. Some readers might see it as a straightforward updating of the Faust story, others as an allegorical satire on the predatory practices of modern-day capitalism. There is no shortage of images of a dystopian near future involving social networks, marketing strategies, the media, concrete jungles and genetic experiments.
]]>The only former Eastern Bloc comics superheroine returns!
Octobriana is the most internationally famous Czech comics character, even though she was created in the early 1970s as a fake by one of the biggest hoaxers of the time Petr Sadecký, and the comics of which she was supposed to be the main heroine never actually existed. The scantily clad (super)heroine, who leads a band of noble revolutionaries in their fight against the Stalinist Soviet regime as well as against capitalism and imperialism, inspired comics artist and writer Bryan Talbot in the 1970s and later other British, American and European creatives. However, the first graphic novel with Octobriana as the main character has appeared only now.
Graphic artist Marek Berger and writer Ondřej Kavalír were inspired by many elements of the comics sketches that Sadecký once used to fool Western European publishers, creating a spectacular new story which takes place in an alternative past reality. It is 1972 and the threat of nuclear war between Western countries, led by the USA, and the Soviet Union, dominated by communist generals, is ever-present. Octobriana works as a Soviet Special Agent and during a new assignment deep in the frozen wastes of the Arctic she has a mystical initiation experience that frees her from the communist regime and connects her to the mythological Lilith. The future fate of the planet and humanity itself depends on her encounters with the adversary Amazon operating in the middle of the Amazon rainforest and her relationship with the unpredictable Lilith.
]]>Štěpánka Jislová’s autobiographical graphic novel looks at the toxicity of some modern relationships and sexual violence. It does so with courage, determination and a real flair for the language of comics.
Growing up on a housing estate in the post-Velvet Revolution years of the 1990s – sexual violence, anxiety around love, toxicity in relationships, and casual sex as both a placebo and a refuge. The intimate personal themes which Štěpánka Jislová broaches and then examines in detail in her autobiographical graphic novel Heartcore have been largely absent from Czech comics up till now. Ambitious, original and inventive in its use of a variety of techniques, this book by one of the most distinctive Czech comics writers of the past decade still comes across as very authentic and lived and will have no trouble standing up to the global competition.
This unapologetically frank story about the painful search for oneself in solitude and in relationships and about first-hand experience of sexual abuse is presented with humour and objectivity. At the same time, it combines artistically elegant stylization with unvarnished honesty in its depiction in order to communicate something that is otherwise virtually impossible to convey. Part generational testimony, part analytical (self)disclosure, with an element of indictment and at least a hint of manifesto, it all adds up to an exceptional graphic novel about what it was like to be a young woman not so long ago and what it is like today, and about the complex and sometimes almost unbearably confusing and traumatic world of modern partnerships and intimate relationships.
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