Reading: As if the past had been erased

Location

entrance Free

In their captivating novel chronicles The Longing for Light (2022) and Šikmý kostel (2020-2024), authors Kati Naumann and Karin Lednická recount the lives of two mining families over several generations. Both authors have a gift for bringing the past back to life. They tell fictional stories, but have researched the historical background in detail. The Schlema Valley in the Ore Mountains is home to the Steiner family, whose story Kati Naumann follows from 1912 to the present day. It all begins with the search for a missing great-uncle, and little by little many secrets come to light. Karin Lednická dedicated three novels to the eventful life of the Pospíšil family, which became bestsellers in the Czech Republic. They are set from 1894 in Karwin on the present-day border between Poland and the Czech Republic, where political and nationalist upheavals occurred time and again. Wars, crises and mining disasters not only claimed human lives, but entire landscapes were also destroyed. All that remains of the old Karwin, an important centre of coal mining, is a small leaning church. Where the village centre of Oberschlema once stood, there is now a park. The transformation of these two places is so complete that it seems as if their past has been erased.