SOURCE: Vamos, Miklos. “Our Czech Uncle.” Nation 257, no. 14 (1 November 1993): 508-10.

In the following review of The Little Town Where Time Stood Still and Cutting It Short, Vamos calls attention to Hrabal's joyous portrayal of everyday Czech life.

If you want to be happy for a couple of hours, read the novels of Bohumil Hrabal. Novels? I'd better say fairy tales, realistic fairy tales that keep you smiling. In his novellas The Little Town Where Time Stood Still and Cutting It Short (the first title a sequel to the second), you actually get two fairy tales for the price of one—Hrabal promises us a good day.

I think most readers would agree that the history of twentieth-century literature is basically a story of unhappiness. Nearly every masterpiece is an account of the unbearable heaviness of being. Modern literature reminds me of old fathers who talk about their youth...