Prague

Novelist Ivan Klima explains in ``The Spirit of Prague'' that his native city has inspired people's creativity by the blending of three cultures that lived side by side for decades, even centuries: Czech, German and Jewish. It is also a city in which ``the best people in the country were often imprisoned, tortured or executed.'' Czech writers deal with such injustices with a subversive sense of humor. It shines in Bohumil Hrabal's description of ``The Hotel Pariz,'' Josef Skvorecky's rendition of President Clinton's sax playing at the Reduta jazz club, Egon Erwin Kisch's ``The Case of the Washerwoman,'' and Jaroslav Hasek's sendup of The Society of Teetotalers. To see human comedy in the midst of great suffering allowed the spirit of Prague to prevail, and that is the genius of the authors presented here. These 24 stories, arranged by the areas of the city they illuminate, are a literary banquet for readers who already know and love ``the city of a hundred spires.'' As such, they are designed, according to editor Wilson, to reveal ``a deeper truth about the psyche of the people of Prague than perhaps direct description could.'' Also included are biographies of contributors and translators and a historical chronology of Prague. (Feb.)