Wretchedness
*LONGLISTED FOR THE INTERNATIONAL BOOKER PRIZE 2021*
Malmö, Sweden. A cellist meets a spun-out junkie. That could have been me. His mind starts to glitch between his memories and the avant-garde music he loves, and he descends into his past, hearing all over again the chaotic song of his youth. He emerges to a different sound, heading for a crash.
From sprawling housing projects to underground clubs and squat parties, Wretchedness is a blistering trip through the underbelly of Europe’s cities. Powered by a furious, unpredictable beat, this is a paean to brotherhood, to those who didn’t make it however hard they fought, and a visceral indictment of the poverty which took them.
Andrzej Tichý was born in Prague to a Polish mother and a Czech father. He has lived in Sweden since 1981. The author of five novels, two short story collections and a wide range of non-fiction and criticism, Tichý is widely recognised as one of the most important novelists of his generation. Wretchedness (Eländet) was shortlisted for the 2016 August Prize and won the 2018 Eyvind Johnson Prize.
A translator of Swedish and Norwegian literature, Nichola Smalley is also publicist at And Other Stories and an escaped academic – in 2014 she finished a PhD at UCL exploring the use of contemporary urban vernaculars in Swedish and UK rap and literature. Her translations range from Jogo Bonito by Henrik Brandão Jönsson (Yellow Jersey Press), a Swedish book about Brazilian football, to the latest novel by Norwegian superstar Jostein Gaarder, An Unreliable Man (Weidenfeld & Nicolson).
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