‘Baśń o wężowym sercu’ by Radek Rak in Czech
The book Báje o hadím srdci, as reads the title of the Czech translation of the book, was published by the Brno-based Host publishing house.
The novel The Tale of the Serpent’s Heart is a fairy-tale fantasy story about the famous leader of the Galician slaughter, Jakub Szela. Published in 2019, the book was very well received by critics and readers alike. For The Tale of the Serpent’s Heart, Radek Rak received the 2020 ‘Nike’ Literary Award, as well as, among others, the Janusz A. Zajdel Award for the best fantasy novel of the year and the ‘Nowa Fantastyka’ Award in the category ‘Polish Book of the Year’.
Before The Tale of the Serpent’s Heart, which brought the author popularity, Rak published the novels Kocham cię, Lilith (“I Love You, Lilith”, 2014) and Puste niebo (“The Empty Sky”, 2016). In 2022, the book Agla. Alef, and this year Agla. Aurora were published – two parts of a trilogy that the Nike winner is currently working on. Radek Rak is a veterinarian by profession.
As part of the ©POLAND Translation Programme, Michala Benešová also introduced Czech readers to the reportage Izrael już nie frunie (‘Israel No Longer Flies’) and Irak. Piekło w raju (‘Iraq. Hell in Paradise’) by Paweł Smoleński (2013 and 2015, both in tandem with Lucie Zakopalova), Toast za przodków (‘A Toast To The Ancestors’) by Wojciech Górecki (2017), Sprawiedliwi zdrajcy. Sąsiedzi z Wołynia (‘Righteous Traitors. Neighbours from Volhynia’) by Witold Szabłowski (2017), Modlitwa o deszcz (‘Praying for Rain’) by Wojciech Jagielski (2018), Cwaniary (‘The Hustlers) by Sylwia Chutnik (2014), Niesamowite przygody dziesięciu skarpetek (czterech prawych i sześciu lewych) [‘Amazing Adventures of Ten Socks (Four Right and Six Left)’] by Justyna Bednarek (2017), Król (”The King of Warsaw”) by Szczepan Twardoch (2020), and Lód (”Ice”) by Jacek Dukaj (together with Michael Alexa, 2021 for which they were awarded the most prestigious Czech literary award Magnesia Litera in the category of Translation).