Original title: Na solar. Nejlepší české povídky od roku 1989
Genre: short stories
Publisher:
Host, 2025
ISBN: 978-80-275-2671-0
Pages: 432
The life and times of post-revolutionary Czechia through its best short stories
Argentine writer Julio Cortázar once said that while a novel can beat the reader on points, a short story must knock him out. A violent comparison, but an accurate one: a good short story goes for the chin or the solar plexus. It is a one-hit wonder. The hit will send you to your knees, out for the count. Which makes it all the more surprising that readers tend to stick with novels and some skip short stories altogether.
This anthology of the best in post-revolutionary Czech short-story writing is for readers on whom no glove has been laid as well as those knocked out many times. In search of the most original short stories to fill a single volume, editor Jan Němec made his way through 200 short-story collections. The resulting choice of 30 names includes usual suspects such as Jan Balabán, Sylva Fischerová and Emil Hakl but also lesser-known ones, such as Vladimíra Valová and Marek Epstein. Together, they form a crystal-clear picture of post-revolutionary Czechia and present a fresh take on recent Czech writing.
"I love short stories. They have given me some of my greatest reading experiences. I’ve always thought it a shame that they are looked down upon. ‘They’re only short stories!’: I’ve been told this many, many times. Short stories can captivate. They can create a picture of our present replete with surprise. Let me show you how. Take that! "
— Jan Němec, editor
Short stories by these writers have been selected:
Michal Ajvaz, Jan Balabán, Barbora Bažantová, Bianca Bellová, Stanislav Beran, Petr Borkovec, Irena Dousková, Edgar Dutka, Marek Epstein, Sylva Fischerová, Emil Hakl, Viktorie Hanišová, Matěj Hořava, Daniel Hradecký, Václav Kahuda, Dora Kaprálová, Jiří Kratochvil, Lubomír Martínek, Ivana Myšková, Ludvík Němec, Petr Pazdera Payne, J. A. Pitínský, Magdaléna Platzová, Petr Šesták, Marek Šindelka, Jaromír Štětina, Miloš Urban, Vladimíra Valová, Michal Viewegh and Sára Vybíralová.
”The Body Blows anthology makes it clear that neither excessive reverence nor betting on well-established names played a role in compiling this book. Just as it was not important whether the stories together form a coherent statement about social and political developments in the country or about how domestic writing was progressing.
(…)
The only thing that matters in Body Blows is the experience of a short, intense text. “I get irritated by readers who say they don’t read short stories at all. I wanted to wave this red book in front of their noses and say: No? So do me a favour – at least try this, it’s served to you on a golden platter,” the writer says, enticingly. What he offers is difficult to describe other than with a boxing metaphor. Bellová’s punchline is a knock-out, as are Kahuda and Hradecký’s poetic images that remain in the memory long after they have been read – as if they left a scar there. Němcová’s book hits home thirty times – and never the same way. “That's what’s beautiful about short stories. That they do something different to you every time,” concludes the editor.”
Jonáš Zbořil, Seznam zprávy
