This Side of Reality: Modern Czech Short Stories

The ghost of Franz Kafka hovers over the bulk of the surreal and absurdist stories collected in this anthology of Czech writing edited by translator and Czech expatriate Buchler. Unfortunately, what was visionary in an isolated turn of the century genius is rather formulaic in the work collected here. The anthology draws mostly on fiction written during the chill that followed the Prague Spring of 1968, much of which was originally published in underground editions. However, two of the collection's strongest pieces are also the most recent, written after the collapse of communism. The extract from Ludvik Vaculik's novel How to Make a Boy is a highly personal account of fatherhood; while Jachym Topol's excerpt, ""A Trip to the Railway Station,"" offers a darkly comic look at the negative impact of consumerism. Ivan Klima and Josef Skvorecky who, (along with Bohumil Hrabal) are the writers best known to American readers in the anthology, both weigh in with pieces which avoid the self-indulgence and obvious allegory that mar much of the volume. Klima's piece, about a writer under constant surveillance who is briefly reunited with an old love, is the collection's strongest. (July)