{"id":8375,"date":"2016-09-22T13:22:27","date_gmt":"2016-09-22T18:22:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/european\/?p=8375"},"modified":"2017-06-09T16:40:49","modified_gmt":"2017-06-09T20:40:49","slug":"event-highlights-european-voices-a-reading-conversation-with-magdalena-platzova","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/european\/2016\/09\/22\/event-highlights-european-voices-a-reading-conversation-with-magdalena-platzova\/","title":{"rendered":"Event Highlights: European Voices: A Reading &#038; Conversation with Magdalena Platzova"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>On Thursday, September 15th, Boston University\u2019s Center for the Study of Europe welcomed Czech author Magdal\u00e9na Platzova and translator Alex Zucker. The event was moderated by Veronika Tuckerova, Preceptor in Slavic Languages and Literatures at Harvard University. <\/p>\n<p>Platzova is the award-winning author of six books, two of which have since been translated and published in English: Aaron\u2019s Leap and The Attempt, a Lidov\u00e9 Noviny Book of the Year Award finalist and a Czech Book Award finalist respectively. Her other works have also appeared in literary magazines A Public Space and Words Without Borders. She has studied in Washington D.C., England, and ultimately got her MA in Philosophy at Charles University in Prague. She has since taught at the Gallatin School at New York University.<\/p>\n<p>Alex Zucker is an award-winning translator of Czech literature. He has translated many prominent Czech authors into English, and he currently serves as the cochair of the PEN America Translation Committee.<\/p>\n<p><a data-flickr-embed=\"true\"  href=\"https:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/11054951@N04\/albums\/72157673005507481\" title=\"09.15.16\"><img loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/c1.staticflickr.com\/9\/8461\/29528037600_92fb8e6d6a_z.jpg\" width=\"710\" height=\"471\" alt=\"09.15.16\"><\/a><script async src=\"\/\/embedr.flickr.com\/assets\/client-code.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p>Platzova\u2019s most recent book, The Attempt, is based on the lives of Alexander Berkman and Emma Goldman, a pair of leading political activists and anarchists, and is told through the archival lens of a Czech historian who is convinced he is Berkman\u2019s great-grandson. The novel takes place when this historian travels to Manhattan during the rise of the Occupy Wall Street movement, tying together themes of personal transformation and radical politics.<\/p>\n<p>A poignant example of historical fiction, The Attempt gives an entirely new meaning to the idea of an anarchist. \u201cThe anarchist thing was very interesting to people,\u201d details Platzova. \u201cThere are some young anarchists who \u2026 were happy someone was finally writing in a positive way about their ideas.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cEven there [in the Czech Republic], their ideas are mostly interpreted and perceived as something bad, as chaos, or stealing and murdering,\u201d she explains. \u201cThere\u2019s this primitive interpretation of anarchist ideas.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>It is no coincidence that the novel took place in New York City, since Platzova was living in New York at the time of the novel\u2019s conception. \u201cIt was destructive \u2026 in New York, but on the other hand it made me more daring than I would be closed in Central Europe, thematically and for perspective,\u201d reflects Platzova. \u201cIt couldn\u2019t have been written anywhere else.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>In addition to being an award-winning author, Platzova is also something of a detective, using her skills in research and journalism to uncover both history and history in the making. \u201cI was reading all this history, thinking, why do people keep silent? Why are they not doing anything? \u2026 And then, [Occupy Wall Street] happened.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cAfter Occupy Wall Street ended in the way it ended, I realized it was also the frame of my book; that all these ideas are going on. They are living on.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>-Toria Rainey \u201818<\/p>\n<p>Watch the event on YouTube:<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"710\" height=\"471\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/EjUrjq4GeOE\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>On Thursday, September 15th, Boston University\u2019s Center for the Study of Europe welcomed Czech author Magdal\u00e9na Platzova and translator Alex Zucker. The event was moderated by Veronika Tuckerova, Preceptor in Slavic Languages and Literatures at Harvard University. Platzova is the award-winning author of six books, two of which have since been translated and published in [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8908,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[3],"tags":[323,320,213,322,324],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/european\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8375"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/european\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/european\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/european\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8908"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/european\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8375"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/european\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8375\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8576,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/european\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8375\/revisions\/8576"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/european\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8375"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/european\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8375"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/european\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8375"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}