Forum Radio: No such thing as the “good old days”

Many Czech readers knew Pavlá Horáková already as the author of the Sexton Beetles trilogy for young readers or for her work as a translator of writers such as Saul Bellow and Kurt Vonnegut. But in 2018, Pavla gained even greater renown for her debut novel for adults titled A Theory of Strangeness, which won the prestigious Magnesia Litera award for prose. The book drew many readers in with its quirky protagonist and her unusual observations. And it became a bestseller. The novel has since been translated into Spanish and Italian, winning her scores of new readers abroad. Last year, Pavla followed up with a second novel called In the Heart of Europe, telling the story of another young protagonist but this time also her great-grandmother some 100 years apart. The author drew upon – and incorporated into the story – her own great-grandmother’s memoir. In doing so, she opened an authentic window to the past, a time when Czechs weren’t independent but were a part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. A time when Vienna, for many, was the centre of the world.