At the beginning of the evening, Ambassador Martin Tlapa welcomed the author and introduced her literary work to the audience of mainly Czech compatriots.

After reading an excerpt from the novel Money from Hitler, a lively discussion developed with the audience not only about the theme of this work, but also across all of her novels. The author listened with interest to how the themes contained in her books also appeal to Czech emigrants in Canada. She expressed her belief that the topic of emigration is so interesting, rich, stimulating and controversial that it is worth literary treatment, and indicated that she may also address this topic in her work in the future.

Both all participants in the discussion and the author were very pleased with the intense interaction and the warm atmosphere of the evening together.

The event was organized in cooperation with the General Consulate of the Czech Republic in Toronto. R Denemarková will present her literary works in the United States as well.

Radka Denemarková is an acclaimed Czech author writing essays, plays, screenplays, short and long novels, double novels and she is known as a literary historian and an accomplished translator of German literature.

She studied German and Czech literature at the Faculty of Arts of Charles University, where she received a doctorate in 1997. She has got numerous scholarships and important awards, mostly in German-speaking countries.

Her books are now published in more than twenty languages. She also writes essays and articles in German, English and Chinese. In all her literary endeavors, she consistently takes a standpoint, blending fiction and fact to create compelling portraits of society. She often deals with topical issues as well as the dark and suppressed sides of European history, rebels against all totalitarianism and patriarchal structures and gives victims a voice.

Radka Denemarková regularly participates in book fairs in Germany, USA, Switzerland, Austria, Colombia, France, Spain and other countries.

Considered by many to be the most important contemporary Czech author, she is the only writer to have won the prestigious Czech literary prize Magnesia Litera four times, to have received numerous awards for her translation work, and in 2019 her politically engaged novel "Hour of Lead" was named Book of the Year. She was banned from ever entering China for her outspoken criticism of the political regime in the country, where she stayed from 2013 to 2017.

Her last book, "Chocolate Blood", was published in 2023.

In 2024, she was inaugurated into the German Academy for Language and Literature and also received the State Medal of Merit of the President of the Czech republic in the field of culture and art, the Austrian Franz Kafka Prize and the European Tolerance Award.

The novel “Money from Hitler”, published in 2006 will be the main point discussion of our literary evening. The story traces the fate of Gita Lauschman, who, after returning from a concentration camp, realizes that she has nowhere to go back to and decides to seek justice at the end of her life.

More about Radka Denemarková (PDF, 2 MB)