I want to begin with a story I would rather not recall too often. It was 1984. I was twenty-three, a philosophy student in the capital, travelling back to Preslav for one of the holidays. I was weighed down by a tangle of thoughts that felt literally impossible to share. The…

Milan Kundera, student, born 1 April 1929 in Brno, resident of Prague VII, student housing, King Jiří VI Street, appeared today at the local police precinct and made a statement concerning Iva Militka, a student living in the same building... With these dry and faceless lines –…

„Shall I leave you alone?“ his mother asked from behind, and coughed – sharp, cutting. He didn’t answer, pulled one of the stools toward him and sank heavily onto it. The coffin swayed threateningly, and he propped it with his knee, glancing in alarm at the dead man, who had…

Somewhere towards the end of town, in a small cottage surrounded by a spacious garden, lived the red-haired Anne with her mother. Her father, whom she visited from time to time in a distant town, had left the house long ago – so long ago that she could no longer remember it…