Where Was the Angel Going?
By Jan Balaban
()
About this ebook
‘Somewhere in the cosmos there are happier places,’ muses Martin Vrána, the hero of Jan Balabán’s novel Where was the Angel Going?. ‘People are transported to the planet Earth for punishment. Part of the punishment is their ignorance of the fact. We’ve forgotten that we’ve forgotten.’ Yet, as this very reflection implies, in Martin’s case, part of his ‘punishment’ is his ever-present memory of an Eden from which he had been expelled. The prototypical outsider, a member of a minority community within a minority community (a Protestant in the overwhelmingly agnostic Czech Republic), Martin, like the survivor of a shipwreck, strives to shore up his vital resources amidst the billows of an inimical world, which constantly advance and threaten to wash away everything he holds dear.
Where was the Angel Going? is a novel made up of forty-six linked stories. As always, Balabán’s prose is so vivid that the reader can practically taste the ‘honey and dust,’ which are the characteristic flavours of Ostrava. And yet, in its lyrical message of love and friendship as basic human needs no less critical than air and water, Where was the Angel Going is nonetheless an eminently universal novel. Everyone will find him or herself in these pages, as we are all of us descended from that first pair of exiles, Adam and Eve.
Translation of this book was supported by the Ministry of Culture of the Czech Republic.
Read more from Jan Balaban
Where Was the Angel Going? Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsMaybe We’re Leaving Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
Related to Where Was the Angel Going?
Related ebooks
Heart over Time Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsVanitas Polite Stories (Lady Tal—A Worldly Woman—The Legend of Madame Krasinska) Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsAriadne in Mantua A Romance in Five Acts Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsAll That Will Be New Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsBlanche: The Maid of Lille Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Book of the Dead Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Gold Machine: Tracking the Ancestors from Highlands to Coffee Colony Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsDay for Night: A Novel Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsPaul and Virginia from the French of J.B.H. de Saint Pierre Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsHard to Be a God Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Sunrise with Sea Monster Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Sarrasine Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Ingoldsby Country: Literary Landmarks of the "Ingoldsby Legends" Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsSalt Picnic Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsMelmoth the Wanderer Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Complete Works of Charles Robert Maturin Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsEssential Novelists - Charles Maturin: the last of the goths Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsMelmoth the Wanderer (Unabridged) Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsPoetry of the Supernatural Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsA Film (3,000 Meters) Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsFrom Plotzk to Boston Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsInnocents Abroad Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsMelmoth the Wanderer Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsAn Ambitious Woman A Novel Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsPebbles on the shore [by] Alpha of the plough Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsElves and Heroes Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Troll Garden and Selected Stories: With an Excerpt by H. L. Mencken Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsVanitas: Polite Stories Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsMelmoth the Wanderer Vol. 1 (of 4) Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
Literary Fiction For You
Prophet Song: A Novel (Booker Prize Winner) Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Catch-22: 50th Anniversary Edition Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5A Confederacy of Dunces Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5A Man Called Ove: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Covenant of Water (Oprah's Book Club) Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The 7 1/2 Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Leave the World Behind: A Read with Jenna Pick Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5All the Ugly and Wonderful Things: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Pride and Prejudice: Bestsellers and famous Books Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Flowers for Algernon Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Queen's Gambit Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Master & Margarita Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Piranesi Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Tender Is the Flesh Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Silmarillion Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Poisonwood Bible: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5My Grandmother Asked Me to Tell You She's Sorry: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Little Birds: Erotica Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Life of Pi: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Cloud Cuckoo Land: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5A Farewell to Arms Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Demon Copperhead: A Pulitzer Prize Winner Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Sympathizer: A Novel (Pulitzer Prize for Fiction) Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Salvage the Bones: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Anna Karenina: Bestsellers and famous Books Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Handmaid's Tale Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Annihilation: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5East of Eden Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Only Woman in the Room: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Old Man and the Sea: The Hemingway Library Edition Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5
Reviews for Where Was the Angel Going?
0 ratings0 reviews