Silberputzen – CDmp3 (te Peter Gbor)

This Czech-language audiobook presents a short novella by one of the most significant contemporary Slovak prose writers, Pavel Vilikovsk (19412020). Its lightly ironic story follows an adolescent boy transferred as a punishment from a grammar school in Vienna to one in Bratislava. Vilikovsks narrative brings to life long-vanished corners of Bratislava full of temptation and erotic challenges, including the notorious Vydrica district. Above all, it opens up the world of an adolescent reminiscent of Trless, the young inmate from Robert Musils famous novella, though he lives in a considerably harsher world than Vilikovsks Andreas Pohl. In his novels, Vilikovsk explored not only the tragic darkness of human character, ending in the snares of the communist secret police, and the sorrow of love fading through illness, but also ironic, light-hearted glimpses into sinful human souls, as in this novella. The recording is read by Peter Gbor.