HYB4 Reading Room: Presentation of "Czech Sea" by Ondřej Macl

Karolinum Publishers invites you to a performative presentation of a monograph on the Czech sea in cultural and literary history.

Book annotation: "The Czech sea as a European literary theme travels across genres, epochs and linguistic regions since Shakespeare's The Winter's Tale. Macl's book not only presents its various occurrences but also revises Czech cultural history from the perspective of seas and oceans influenced by the so-called blue humanities. The examined corpus of texts thus expands to include reflections on prehistoric seas, colonial fantasies, travel narratives, maritime memoirs and exile poetry, demonstrating that the boundary between land and sea is not as fixed as maps suggest, but runs through our bodies as well. The Czech sea opens before us as a question of life on an inscrutable blue planet."

Mgr. et MgA. Ondřej Macl, Ph.D. (born 1989) studied comparative literature at Charles University, authorial acting at DAMU, and social work and journalism at Masaryk University in Brno. He writes, performs, and occasionally translates (Roland Barthes, Oscar Wilde and others), edits in Prostor Review and assists people with disabilities. For his debut "I Love My Grandmother More Than Young Girls" (2017) he received the Jiří Orten Prize. Most recently, his collection of poetic remixes "Keep Playing" (2025), short stories "Once in a Blue Moon" (2026) and novella "Black Bridge" (2026) were published.

The illustrations in the header of this event and on the cover of the published book are by Miroslav Huptych.

Literary evenings curated by the Prostor Review editorial team in the HYB4 Reading Room are created with financial support from the City of Prague, the Ministry of Culture and the State Fund for Culture of the Czech Republic.

This event takes place as part of the Perspectives project - a new brand for independent, constructive, multiperspective and transnational journalism: www.perspectives-media.eu. Co-financed by the European Union.