Postřižiny

Short is indeed the key word here; a 120-page novel in 12 short chapters, told from the POV of a woman in a small Czech village in the first half of the 20th century as the modern world starts closing in. Maryska (based on Hrabal's own mother) is the wife of Francin, who oversees daily operations at the local brewery, and her life is one joy after another; precious gifts from her loving (but reserved and very busy) husband every time he comes back from Prague, taking long bike rides with her long hair flowing behind her, lighting the old-fashioned lamps at the brewery after the generator closes down at night, helping out with the annual pig slaughter and sampling the results... and of course, helping take care of Francin's brother who came back from the war a little weird and won't leave.

There's a great deal of warmth mixed with almost slapstickish bizarre humour in this, with kooky but alive small-town characters and told in a beautifully descriptive, down-to-earth language. Hrabal is such a great stylist that you'd almost be forgiven for thinking it's a pure piece of comic nostalgia about how everything was better and simpler back in the good old days - the novel ends before Hrabal himself is actually born.

But then there's the knowledge that this was a piece of forbidden literature back in the 70s, and the longer we get into the novel, the more a creepy undertone starts appearing as things start getting... shorter. Skirts, hair, tails, lives. As humorous as the presentation is, everything that gets cut off or out makes life poorer, duller, darker. Considering the circumstances it was written under, the subtext is subtle but insidious: the more of the little unnecessary, fun bits of life you cut off, the less humorous it gets. And then the jokes, and the stories, stop and all that remains is authority and punishment.

And, of course, a whole lot of laughter in between. It is mostly a comedy, after all. Just a darker one than it seems at first.