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Jan Křesadlo: Mrchopěvci (Gravelarks)

If you were wondering about the English language title, as I was, it refers to people who sing professionally at funerals. These singers, and one in particular, are the focus of this novel. This is during the communist era in Czechoslovakia. For the singers, who are not well paid, one of the advantages of this job is that death and funerals seem to be one area where the communist do not hold sway. There are no signs exhorting the various cemetery staff to bury more bodies or the like.

At the start of this book we are introduced to the four singers in this particular group though during the course of the book there is the odd change. The descriptions of the four are quite colourful e.g. The next man strongly resembled a parrot. However, our focus is onZderad. Zderad had a ffairly easy start to life, but then it all went wrong. His father was arrested though his family did not know why they were finally told that he had committed suicide in prison. His mother did not survive her husband’s death and his sister disappeared without trace. He managed to survive and did his national service, but it was obvious he was not going to get a good job with his family history. He ends up as a grave singer. He lived near a lake and saw a nymph swimming in the lake. It turns out that she was not a nymph but an ordinary woman called Sylva and they marry and have a son. They live in a coffinshaped room in a housing complex. On the floor which is shared with many other people, there is only one tap and one toilet. Both of them work though are both paid badly so they do struggle.

More than once while engaged in singing Zderad sees a strange person he calls The Man. He seems to be following.Zderad and one day approaches him gives him a photocopy of a document and tells him to meet him in a remote part of the cemetery. The document turns out to be a poem written in Greek, whichZderad had written many years ago. It is in the form of a poem and it is highly critical of. Stalin. People had been shot for less..

The man is well dressed and clearly well educated. which Zderad finds odd because during that era people on the whole did not dress well. He is of course frightened that the man is from the Secret Service and may want to arrest him or blackmail him for money which he does not have.

At this point, it may be appropriate to mention thatKřesadlo was, by profession a psychiatrist and specialised in what was then known as sexual deviation with a particular interest in homosexuality. Yes.The Man simply wants a homosexual relationship with our hero and we do get some of the details. While.Zderad is obviously not happy about this, there is an upside in that the man gives him regular amount of money whichZderad can well use and does.

Naturally, he tries to find out whoThe Man is whom he now callsTh Monster, is. He tries following him but TheMonster always out wits him. TheMonster becomes more and more demanding, for example suggesting that they have a fake wedding and of course, among other things he is into ssadomasochism. Meanwhile,while nZderad is enjoying the money, buying books which he hides from his wife and also helping with the household expenses.

Slowly, but surely he picks up clues and eventually does identify the man who, of course, is married with children. However, the question is what can he do even though he knows who he is.

With the help of some gypsy friends, he decides to break into the man’s house when he’s away and see if he can find the incriminating document. It turns out that theMonster has a palatial residence and there are any numbers of places that the incriminating document could be hidden.

Despite the financial benefits, he feels more and more that he is losing touch with the real world.Sylva Sylva seems better dressed and we have an idea why and soon so does he.

Zderad is a highly intelligent and educated man and we follow some of his interest, including the various pieces of music they play and sing at the funerals, his interest in ancient Greek poetry, the issues facing the country with the ruthless communists in power where the well to do seem to be able to do what they want and get away with it and finallyZderad’s thoughts on where all this is going. He contemplates suicide but really is at a loss to know what to do.

It is 1953 and Stalin dies. Zderad had not thought of the implications of this as regards to blackmail but theMonster had and he comes up with a different approach to blackmailingZderad.

Things get worse whenSylva tells him that she wants a divorce. This is not because she does not love him anymore, which she does, but because her boss has blackmailed her and she feels that that there is no choice but to accede to his wishes. The situation now gets worse. The Monster is going away on holiday, but when he returns, he wants threesome involving.Sylva.

Quoting from the Bible he comments They have put me into the hands of the ungodly and cast me among criminals.
And they spared not my soul.

This is a very dark book not least becauseKresadlo had no love for the communists, indeed he hated them. They are shown as totally evil and their victims the ordinary people of Czechoslovakia.I If you need any more convincing about this , and if you have read other Czech novels of the period you probably do not, this should really convince you. It is a very well written and often erudite book which makes for interesting. though not necessarily fun necessarily fun reading.

Publishing history

First published in 1994 by 68 Publishers
First published in English in 2015by Jantar
Translated by Václav Pinkava