Dear Adéla Knapová, what’s your routine at the moment?

I am currently living in Kharkiv in Ukraine for a long time. And so my routine had to adapt not only to the constant Russian bombing. In addition to my own writing, which I always try to do early in the morning with a fountain pen and paper, I try to perceive the place, the city, the situation as much as possible. But in general I write in the morning. I’m either working on a new novel, or on a weekly commentary for a Czech newspaper, or I’m writing a report. After that, I go to one of my favorite cafés for a coffee. Or I go with local volunteers to the front to help evacuate the last residents and feed the abandoned animals. Or I meet local artists and philosophers, intellectuals…mostly already my friends, and we debate. It is a difficult and at the same time revolutionary time. And in the evenings, we often work together with my partner, the Kharkov cult artist Kostiantyn Zorkin – he is currently creating illustrations for my book of Kharkov short stories, which I have already written here and which will be published in the Czech Republic in the spring.

What’s now particularly important for all of us?

Respect for life. Every life matters. None of us has the right to take it from others, and none of us has the right to knowingly torture or harm others. I felt it long before the war. And here I realize it every day.

New start, new beginning. What will be essential and which new roles will literature and art play in society?

The role of art and literature is crucial for any civilization. I can see it here, in Kharkiv, every day. Art is here a real life changer. In the worst possible times full of death and fear, hopelessness and despair it gives people hope, strenght, context, helps them feel love, importance of inner integrity and bravery, solidarity, shows perspectives… Without culture, we do not know our roots, we have no idea who we are, how to live and why. And without literature we fall into the void. Every life, every day is a story. We can perceive ourselves only as a part of our own life story. Humanity is woven from stories, we are part of this dense fabric, which is also made up of literature.

What are you reading currently?

Documentaries about the Ukrainian famine and the Katyn massacre. When I’m working on a new novel like I am now, I can’t read fiction.

Which quote, text will you propose to us?

Sometimes even the worst and most hopeless things turn out well.

Vielen Dank für das Interview, liebe Adéla, viel Freude und Erfolg weiterhin für Deine großartigen Literaturprojekte und persönlich alles Gute! 

5 Fragen an Künstler*innen: Adéla Knapová, writer, journalist

Zur Person/über mich/about:  Adéla Knapová, Czech writer and journalist. 

She is well-known for her novels, novellas and original reports especially for the weekly Reflex, where she was a chief-reporter for over fourteen years. Winner of numerous awards for her work, she also campaigns for animal welfare. Now she writes weekly commentaries and in-depth reportages for the Czech daily Právo. 

She drew attention to herself early on with her first reports for the monthly Koktejl and then with her successful first novel The Uninvited in 2003, which she herself now calls invalid. 

In 2016 the Fra publishers brought out her novella The Impossibility of Zero, which Czech Radio ranked among the best Czech and foreign books of the year. Her critically acclaimed novel The Primer was published in 2017, followed two years later by Vanguard.Her latest novel Cowardly Notes from the Ukraine War was published by Fra in 2023 and was inspired by her reporting trip through war-torn Ukraine soon after the full scale invasion started. This novel is being translated into numerous languages including Ukrainian. 

A book of reports from wartime Ukraine was named after her reportage story Bread from the Minefield. This title and the story inspired in the September 2023 the Czech Ministry of the Interior to the event We bake bread from a minefield, the aim of which was to raise money for the demining system BOŽENA for Ukraine. 

Adéla Knapová also writes short stories and essays, and she is the author of a series of one-act plays. Her texts are part of foreign anthologies of Czech and European authors.

In 2023 she established the Endowment fund ONE HEART to help improve living conditions of animals not only across the EU.

Aktueller Termin: 3.Dezember 24 Di 19:00

Österreichische Gesellschaft für Literatur, Herrengasse 5, 1010 Wien

Adéla Knapová: CZ-AT (t∫æt) MIT MICHAEL STAVARIČ

Adéla Knapová: »Eine Pussy im Ukraine Krieg« (»Zbabělé zápisky z ukrajinské války«; teilw. übers. von D. Kouba)

In seiner Gesprächsreihe lädt Michael Stavarič Autor*innen aus Tschechien ein und überrascht diese mit ungewöhnlichen Fragen: zu ihrem Werk, der Literatur im Allgemeinen und dem Zustand der Welt im Besonderen.

An diesem auf Tschechisch und Deutsch stattfindenden Abend spricht Adéla Knapová über ihre nur wenige Stunden nach Kriegsbeginn im Februar 2022 angetretene Reise in die Ukraine und das daraus entstandene Buch.

Gemeinsam mit dem Tschechischen Zentrum Wien

https://www.ogl.at/programm/aktuelles-programm/archiv/2024/12/#event-3861

Foto: privat

Vielen Dank an Michael Stavarič, Schriftsteller _ Wien _ für die Vermittlung des Interviews und alle Bemühungen!

Walter Pobaschnig _ 25.11.2024

https://literaturoutdoors.com