A long, long time ago in a town far, far away a very clever man composed a cycle of poems based on traditional stories that he had spent years collecting in the Czech countryside and the Slavonic folklore he had been studying. He first published these poems in 1853. This came after a three volume work containing 150 folk songs. He was, after all, what amounted to be one of the first Czech cultural historians and a lot more besides. Also, to be consistent with this narrative, let's remember he was determined, tenacious and brave.
Closer to home, Susan first began translating the poems that make up the collection, Kytice, in 2002. Some of them are very long and others maybe not so long but certainly "difficult". However, she did have the music of Dvořák and many friends to help her along the way. The Water-goblins also helped.
Drafts had been passed around just about everyone involved in teaching, studying and even publishing Czech literature by 2004. Susan's rendering of the poems nearly got published that year and in anticipation, she took part in an interview and reading for Radio Prague's "Czech Books" programme.
The proposed publishing deal fell through and Susan got on with her life. Being brave and determined, she continued working at the British Library and translating Danish and Norwegian plays, French and German poetry and opera librettos into English. (I have skipped a huge amount here....her bibliography is very impressive).
Many years later, Susan's rendering of the poems came to the attention of Jantar when she read a few at the Czech and Slovak Literary Seminar at UCL SSEES. Sitting mesmorised (along with everyone else, she is a very good reader) in that gathering was the author of this blog and Jantar CEO, Mike. He was too bedazzled to contemplate publishing the poems. Actually, he thought they had already been published but didn't check his understanding till much later.
Fast forward to a dark and windy night in London on 12 December 2013. Susan hobbled bravely to the launch party at UCL SSEES with the aid of a crutch and two helpers (she had hurt her ankle) and bags of cakes. Jantar supplied lots of wine, Peter Zusi, provided a wonderful introduction and then Susan stood up with her crutch and read a few of the shorter poems. She was amazing....many people took photos of the evening that were posted onto our facebook page.
Jantar sold most of the copies we brought but the news just got better. The following morning, Britské Listy published an excellent review and then guided its many (and mostly) Czech readers to the Shakespeare a Synove bookshop in Prague. The shop then reported a queue of people outside waiting for it to open. They kept selling so many copies that we were unable to supply any other shops in the country. As a result, Kytice was top of their best seller list at Christmas and well into 2014.
In most stories, the narrative ends there with everyone living happily ever after because amazing poetry brought peace to the people of London but while that is true, more was to follow, the poetry then took on a life of its own.....read on...
In January 2014, Susan appeared on Radio Prague's Czech Books programme again. This time speaking about the influence Dvořák's tone poems on her translations. Then in February, Susan was invited to give a reading and ask questions at an event organised by the BCSA held at the Czech Embassy in London. Once again, Susan's performance was so incredible that she was asked to perform an encore (!) of The Water-goblin (Hugh caught this on camera).
At the end of February, Kytice was reviewed in the Times Literary Supplement (TLS). Then in the middle of March, one of our friends noticed that Kytice was number 43 in the best selling poetry list on Amazon USA and asked "why?".
At first we thought that it was due the TLS review and then another friend sent a link to the weekend review section of the New York Times.....Helen Oyeyemi, an up and coming author had been offering her views on life and literature....and the answer to the question, "What was the last truly great book you read?" was "Susan
Reynolds’s translation of “Kytice” (“Bouquet”), Karel Erben’s classic
cycle of Czech folk tales in verse. I don’t really know how to describe
these stories, except that most of them are profoundly strange, with
outcomes that you shrink from rather than anticipate, and so you simply
pause from time to time to make peace with your goose bumps. The very
particular rhythm of the verse contributes to its effect, which makes
the translation all the more impressive."
Meanwhile, in Prague, word was spreading about Susan's marvelous
translation.The organisers of the Prague Book Fair invited Susan to read at the fair and offered Jantar its
own stand.
To celebrate the success of the book so far, our invitation to the Prague Book Fair, and the fact that we kept selling out copies of Kytice printed in small print runs, we decided to publish a special limited edition "Czech edition" of the collection in a hardback format. The book was printed by the wonderful team at Tiskárna Protisk in České Budějovice.
Further invitations followed and Susan ended up giving five readings and being interviewed twice on Czech TV in the space of a few days in May.
Now the book is stocked by ore shops in the Czech Republic, some specially selected shops in the UK is available to all on amazon....
We all continue to live happily ever after because we know the Water-goblins are on our side...
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