Bringing Up Girls In Bohemia [antikvár]

1. The oddest thing of all, the thing that most strikes us when we embark on a story is the total void spreading out before us. The events have occurred and lie all around us in a continuous, formless mass without beginning or end. We can start anywhere Vera Linhartova When I returned from school that Wednesday with my daughter, the letter-box was literally full to bursting: apart from the usual Lidove noviny, it contained a large brown envelope with the page proofs of my novel plus a white envelope also addressed to me, and finally that controversial blue cellophane packet containing an advertising sample of a Procter and Gamble product. As I locked the letter-box, I noticed that the label with our name had been scored through with something sharp, most likely the key of some young enemy of all teachers. The white envelope contained a brief letter from Krai, our local millionaire, offering me a lucrative part-time job with easy hours. In other words, the beginning of this story did not lie in a formless mass in a total void, but in a white envelope in our letter-box on 16th June 1992. "Anything in the mail?" my wife asked. "1 got the page proofs of my novel and an offer of a lucrative job," I said. "You got some sanitary towels." My sincere compliments to Czech feminists. I later read the letter more closely. I deduced that it was most likely a matter of coaching Agata, but 1 was rather perturbed that Krai clearly took it for granted, although he did not actually say as