My Golden Trades by Ivan Klima

What a book, what a meal, what company! My memory of the talk that flowed around the table is already a little dim ... but I do know it was a wonderful evening with a book that gave us so much to talk about from within its own covers and branching out to government spending on health and defence and how crazy the big banks make us all. If only I hadn’t had that second martini and stopped caring about taking the notes I could have parlayed some of what was said back again in this review!

Mary chose Klima because she sees him as a true artist and creator. His writing can be melancholic but it’s not depressing, there’s humour in the bleakness. She selected My Golden Trades in particular because of its short story format … something BBC’ers could all finish, in part if not completely, in the short time between our two July get togethers. Or so she thought!

Mark managed five pages before realising that this Eastern European gunk wasn’t his cup of tea. Kevin read two of the stories – The Smuggler and The Artist – and just couldn’t get drawn into the book. He didn’t feel affected by the writing, and even declared feeling annoyed by the Artist when he wouldn’t draw the picture of the girl for the mother.

But those two aside, the rest of us at table reveled in the writing. (Except Nathalie, who hadn’t had a chance to read the book but did manage to bring fresh Leonadis chocolates back from Belgium for us to feast on).

Raj regretted not being able to read the book in Czech because he was tantalized by the sparseness of Klima’s descriptions, the injection of stream of consciousness writing. He wanted to be able to savour the language of the book without the mistakes that came through in the translation.

For Dennis the book was exquisite. So much beauty and deep philosophical ponderings expressed so simply. He quoted some wonderful stuff from the book … and by that time I had moved from martinis to red wine and couldn’t possibly relate anything about Dennis’s quotes. Page 61 and raging demons ring a faint bell.

This reviewer loved My Golden Trades! And apart from recommending the book can also recommend this interview with Klima

http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2009/aug/02/ivan-klima-interview

Scores for the book:

Mary 8.5
Leanne 8.5
Kevin 6
Mark 6
Raj 8
Dennis 8

I also recommend Mary’s sticky pork, anything that Nathalie brings back from Belgium, and getting together with wonderful company on a regular basis too.