Once upon a time I read a book about the Czech Republic where someone (the author? the editor?) translated some of the Czech words but none of the German ones, which annoyed me because I took Russian in university, not German, and could often suss out the Slavic-based Czech on my own, whereas the German remained incomprehensible to me. Similarly (sort-of, maybe — okay it’s a bit of stretch), I keep putting the ‘z’ in Urzidil in odd places where I think it should be because I guess even the more Slavic parts of Czech culture ended up being just as incomprehensible to me as the German words in another book that is in no way related to this one, The Last Bell, that I’m supposed to be reviewing.
So the whole thing feels like a dream. I read the stories in bed, before sleeping, so maybe that’s why. Maybe it’s because there’s a story about a talking painting and another about a girl who can touch nature. There’s also a story about villagers on either side of a pond fighting about cheesecakes and venison. There are bank clerks and forest wardens and countries (Czechoslovakia) that no longer exist and none of it seems real because it isn’t real anymore, after Nazis and Soviets and globalization destroyed it all. What was that Zweig book I read awhile ago: Messages from a Lost World? They gave the title to the wrong book, s’all I’m saying.
Maybe I should go to Prague, other parts of Bohemia. Maybe then this will all seem real. Well, not the talking stolen portrait part I hope.
The Last Bell by Johannes Urzidil went on sale April 25, 2017.
I received a copy free from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.