Bylo nás pět – Poláček Karel (2023)

Poláček's intense view of a happy childhood is unparalleled in world literature, as he wrote his masterpiece during a tragic time when he was not allowed to publish, and by 1944 he already knew that he was facing transport to hell from which people do not return. What relief it must have brought him to return to the amazing landscape of his childhood, where everything under the sun is new and wonderful, and where he meets his mother again – a happy reader would never guess that Poláček lost her at the age of seven. As an experienced author and keen observer of people and the world, he avoided sentimental idyll and allowed the little hero to describe his stories and escapades in a borrowed, convoluted language of school and adults, so we can laugh heartily at the old-fashioned, moralizing speech in contrast to the serious childlike naivety. The author – that wicked satirist who could not appear in his hometown for ten years – does not mock the middle class's small virtues and narrow outlook, and his humor is kind. However, the world of those conventions has long since collapsed. "Bejval Antonín said in a quiet voice that he was out in the field and there in the hedge he discovered a wasp's nest. He said that we could take the nest and bring the combs with the young home and start our own wasp hive. He is quite surprised that people only keep bees when...