Mädi - Paměti Elisabeth Whitby, rozené hraběnky Dubské – Hloušková Kateřina (2025)

Mädi. That's what they called Elisabeth Giselle Countess Dubská, whose life is like a novel that is hard to put down, set aside, or simply forget. Her memoirs, originally intended only for her closest family, are a breathtaking testimony to the life of a brave woman swept away by the whirlwind of world history. Elisabeth was a descendant of the old Czech family Dubský from Třebomyslice, which settled in Moravia as early as the 16th century. Among Elisabeth's ancestors, we find significant diplomats, soldiers, and politicians; her great-aunt was Marie Ebner-Eschenbach, a famous German-speaking writer compared to our Božena Němcová. The Dubský family were Moravian patriots of the German language, and so was Elisabeth. In her memoirs, she spares no details, candidly describing the coexistence of Czechs and Germans in Czechoslovakia, the allure of German nationalism, the necessity of coming to terms with Nazism, the horrors of World War II, the equally brutal rise of communism, and the bittersweet years in exile.

The memoirs of Elisabeth Whitby, born Countess Dubská, are a gripping read that lacks nothing of great romantic stories – tenderness, passionate love, death, pain, humiliation, injustice..., but also hope, strength of spirit, and the desire to live, which ultimately help to overcome even...