Did you know that there are so many immigrants from the Czech Republic living in America that there is even a Czech-American capital? It is located in Nebraska, where the Czechs founded entire villages, where they still observe Czech traditions and speak Czech among themselves.
Renáta Fučíková maps the fate of the Czechs across the ocean from the time of the discovery of the new continent and the first settlement to modern history. It tells about those who fled from Catholic persecution, emigrated before the Nazis and then the Communists, or fled during economic crises. Whether it was important Czech artists such as Arnošt Lustig or Miloš Forman, successful businessmen such as Tomáš Baťa or important personalities of international politics and public life such as Alice Masaryková or Madeleine Albrightová, their stories have much in common. They were often interwoven with struggle, violence, animosity, but also adventure. And although most of them had to overcome great obstacles on their way overseas, they all came to know the unlimited possibilities and freedom that the United States of America offered them.
You will learn, for example, that the New World, i.e. today's United States, was formerly called Bohemia - after a man named Martin Bohemus, who was indirectly responsible for the discovery of the new continent and whose family came from the Czech basin. Although the author describes the lives of Czechs in America briefly, it is enough to create an image of those times and to supplement knowledge about the historical development of America.
While reading, I also appreciated the author's rich and very successful illustrations, which are actually more than the text in the book. Even so, I would rather recommend it to children of older school age, for example before history classes, and to adults as well. Although the book is written in a relatively comprehensible way, younger children would probably lack the necessary knowledge to understand it and would not be able to keep their attention while reading. However, in my opinion, older readers will definitely get a comprehensive picture of the development of the territory of today's USA. At the same time, they will also better understand the feelings that Czech immigrants in the United States experienced and often still experience - i.e. homesickness, sadness, but also Czech cohesion and pride from overcoming life's hardships.
Josefína Folprechtová
FUČÍKOVÁ, Renáta: Historie Čechů v USA. Praha: Práh, 2019.
The review was created at the Department of Journalism of FSV UK under the supervision of PhDr. Jana Čeňková, Ph.D.