This is a collection of Jan Neruda's intimate, wry, bittersweet stories of life among the inhabitants of the Little Quarter of nineteenth-century Prague. These finely tuned and varied vignettes established Neruda as the quintessential Czech nineteenth-century realist, the Charles Dickens of a Prague becoming ever more aware of itself as a Czech rather than an Austrian city.
Prague Tales is a classic by a writer whose influence has been acknowledged by generations of Czech writers, including Ivan Klíma, who contributes an introduction to this new translation.
- Cover
- Front matter
- Untitled
- Series title page
- Title page
- copyright page
- Contents
- Introduction by Ivan Klíma
- A Week in a Quiet House
- I In Night Clothes
- II Most of the House Begins to Stir
- III At Home with the Landlord
- IV A Lyrical Monologue
- V Bachelorhood is Bliss
- VI A Manuscript and a Storm Cloud
- VII Fragments from the Notes of a Scrivener
- VIII At the Funeral
- IX Further Proof of the Pudding
- X In a Moment of Agitation
- XI A First Attempt at Fiction
- XII Five Minutes after the Recital
- XIII After the Draw
- XIV A Happy Family
- XV The Week Draws to a Close
- Mr Ryšánek and Mr Schlegel
- A Beggar Brought to Ruin
- The Tender Heart of Mrs Rus
- Evening Chitchat
- Doctor Spoiler
- The Water Sprite
- How Mr Vorel Broke in His Meerschaum
- The Three Lilies
- The St Wenceslas Mass
- How It Came to Pass
- Written This Year on All Souls’ Day
- Figures
- Notes
- Back cover