Jump to ratings and reviews
Rate this book

Perlička na dně

Rate this book
Zbiór jedenastu znakomitych opowiadań Bohumila Hrabala, prawdziwych narracyjnych perełek, w których przypadkowe spotkania i przelotne rozmowy odsłaniają na chwilę głębię ludzkich namiętności i tęsknot. W książce odnaleźć można ważne postaci i wątki powracające w prozie Hrabala we wciąż nowych odsłonach.

133 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1963

10 people are currently reading
155 people want to read

About the author

Bohumil Hrabal

187 books1,322 followers
Born in Brno-Židenice, Moravia, he lived briefly in Polná, but was raised in the Nymburk brewery as the manager's stepson.

Hrabal received a Law degree from Prague's Charles University, and lived in the city from the late 1940s on.

He worked as a manual laborer alongside Vladimír Boudník in the Kladno ironworks in the 1950s, an experience which inspired the "hyper-realist" texts he was writing at the time.

His best known novels were Closely Watched Trains (1965) and I Served the King of England. In 1965 he bought a cottage in Kersko, which he used to visit till the end of his life, and where he kept cats ("kočenky").

He was a great storyteller; his popular pub was At the Golden Tiger (U zlatého tygra) on Husova Street in Prague, where he met the Czech President Václav Havel, the American President Bill Clinton and the then-US ambassador to the UN Madeleine Albright on January 11th, 1994.

Several of his works were not published in Czechoslovakia due to the objections of the authorities, including The Little Town Where Time Stood Still (Městečko, kde se zastavil čas) and I Served the King of England (Obsluhoval jsem anglického krále).

He died when he fell from a fifth floor hospital where he was apparently trying to feed pigeons. It was noted that Hrabal lived on the fifth floor of his apartment building and that suicides by leaping from a fifth-floor window were mentioned in several of his books.

He was buried in a family grave in the cemetery in Hradištko. In the same grave his mother "Maryška", step father "Francin", uncle "Pepin", wife "Pipsi" and brother "Slávek" were buried.

He wrote with an expressive, highly visual style, often using long sentences; in fact his work Dancing Lessons for the Advanced in Age (1964) (Taneční hodiny pro starší a pokročilé) is made up of just one sentence. Many of Hrabal's characters are portrayed as "wise fools" - simpletons with occasional or inadvertent profound thoughts - who are also given to coarse humour, lewdness, and a determination to survive and enjoy oneself despite harsh circumstances. Political quandaries and their concomitant moral ambiguities are also a recurrent theme.

Along with Jaroslav Hašek, Karel Čapek, and Milan Kundera - who were also imaginative and amusing satirists - he is considered one of the greatest Czech writers of the 20th century. His works have been translated into 27 languages.

Ratings & Reviews

What do you think?
Rate this book

Friends & Following

Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!

Community Reviews

5 stars
81 (29%)
4 stars
104 (37%)
3 stars
68 (24%)
2 stars
16 (5%)
1 star
5 (1%)
Displaying 1 - 19 of 19 reviews
Profile Image for Come Musica.
2,068 reviews630 followers
August 3, 2020
In questa raccolta di dodici racconti, Bohumil Hrabal fa parlare la gente comune che lavora, passeggia, prende il sole, beve birra; gente comune che, in una parola sola, vive e che proprio nell'atto stesso di vive, racconta.
Scrive la traduttrice Laura Angeloni: "è attraverso la parola che cercano di emergere dall’invisibilità in cui sono relegati e svelano la loro identità più profonda, composta di ciò che sono e che sono stati, ma anche di ciò che avrebbero voluto, o hanno sognato, di essere. Ed è in quel momento che il riflettore di Hrabal li illumina, mostrandoceli nell’attimo in cui « si sono strappati di colpo la camicia e mi hanno mostrato il cuore »."

Hrabal quindi da scrittore diventa un trascrittore, taglia e monta dialoghi, per riprodurre "i discorsi della gente comune, assemblandoli in un susseguirsi di voci che con la tipica genuinità e vivacezza della lingua orale danno vita alla polifonia di ciascun racconto."

Scrive lo stesso autore alla fine dei racconti: "La perlina sul fondo non racconta le avventure di un orecchino di perla precipitato sul fondo di un pozzo secco, né di un uomo soprannominato Perlina che ha toccato il fondo. La perlina sul fondo non contiene nemmeno testi che nel loro sovratesto e sottotesto nascondono allegorie o simboli. E tanto meno racconti che si basano su un punto di svolta. Piuttosto ne La perlina sul fondo ho spostato la perlina al di là del fondo del libro. Volevo piuttosto indurre il lettore a riflettere sul fascio di luce di questi racconti, in cui le persone entrano all’improvviso per poi uscirne altrettanto all’improvviso, come se, avendo percorso insieme un pezzo di strada sul tram, da frammenti di conversazione e pochi gesti fossimo riusciti a conoscerli in profondità. Lasciando poi al lettore, nel caso ne abbia voglia, il compito di depositare sul proprio fondo le proprie perline. Grazie a quest’esperienza così forte i valori delle biblioteche universitarie riprendono vita e ogni più incredibile avventura umana rappresenta di per sé un’allegoria, un simbolo, e nasconde il punto di svolta e la perlina sul fondo anche al di là del suo fondo."

Non avevo mai letto Bohumil Hrabal prima di questo libro.
A ben predispormi nei confronti di questa lettura è stato il fatto che ami sia gli scrittori cechi sia leggere racconti.
Leggerò sicuramente altro di questo autore.
Profile Image for Bětka.
312 reviews9 followers
March 27, 2015
Já nevím, ten Hrabal prostě není pro mě. Nesedí mi.
Profile Image for Ola.
33 reviews4 followers
May 5, 2023
W kategorii książka typu dialogi z Rancza albo Kiepskich 6/5 ⭐️Przyznaję, że nie zdążyłam przeczytać ostatnich 20stron zanim nadszedł termin oddania do biblioteki. Oby te 20 stron to nie był gamechanger, który mógłby wpłynąć na moje rating tej książki tutaj
Profile Image for Róbert Šedivý.
272 reviews4 followers
June 13, 2022
V úvahách o literatúre sa neustále stretávame s pojmom „pravdivosť“. A pretože v umení nie je nič čierne alebo biele, je dobré, že tento pojem v sebe skrýva niekoľko jemných odtienkov – jeden pravdu prezentuje, druhý ju hľadá, tretí po nej túži a z iného len tak opadáva. Na začiatku 60. rokov začali v českých literárnych časopisoch vychádzať osobité poviedky, z ktorých pravda bez väčšieho vypätia skutočne opadávala. Ich autorom bol istý Hrabal... Jeho texty si nachádzali čoraz viac čitateľov a z neznámeho pána v rokoch sa stala hviezda. Prvá zbierka jeho poviedok – nazval ju – Perlička na dně – bola skutočnou literárnou udalosťou. Oprávnene.

Profile Image for Klára.
190 reviews
April 14, 2019
První povídky jsem se musela hodně soustředit, vztekala jsem se, že v nich necítím to kouzlo, o které asi šlo, protože nerozumím motocyklům a továrnám, ale zkusila jsem z toho procítit a pochopit tu trochu, kterou jsem dešifrovala. Další povídky pohladily po duši, pozvedly náladu.
Profile Image for elizabeth.
53 reviews17 followers
July 25, 2022
When you get a book as a present from someone whose opinion on literature matters a great deal to you, you subconsciously want to love the book. Especially when it comes with a personal note (and the one I got in this book truly warmed my heart)!

Unfortunately, I just didn't love this one. Some stories were better than others. Unfortunately, it wasn't even because I don't care about motorcycles or pubs, but because I couldn't find the short stories relatable, nor written in enough depth to make them more memorable.

Although, what I loved about this book was the setting of Prague in 1950s, which is always welcome (especially when being far from home).
Profile Image for Barbora H..
13 reviews
February 15, 2018
Nechci hanit mnohými obdivované autora, ale jeho styl psaní vůbec není pro mě. Při čtení jsem se ztrácela, nudila se a nezaujalo mě to. Ani nepřemýšlím, že bych si přečetla něco z jeho známější tvorby.
Profile Image for Mek.
37 reviews3 followers
May 6, 2014
Tahle knížka s lety malounko vyčpěla...ale abych nebyla nespravedlivá, vyjímám z tohohle odsudku povídku Podvodníci - vážně skvělá!
66 reviews3 followers
August 20, 2014
Čte se dobře, Hrabal to s jazykem prostě uměl, ale chvilkama mi to už připadalo zdlouhavé, zřejmě proto, že neholduji motocyklům.
Profile Image for Maurizio Manco.
Author 7 books132 followers
May 23, 2021
"E' pieno di gente che confonde quello che avrebbe voluto essere con quello che è davvero." (p. 115)

"Se Dio esiste deve avere i nervi d'acciaio." (p. 159)
Profile Image for Siri Hsu.
185 reviews1 follower
Read
July 1, 2022
第四本赫拉巴爾。 的確像譯後記說的,讀赫拉巴爾就是從生疏不理解到逐漸有所得的過程。大量對話與「中魔的人們」——「彷彿與他們同路坐了一段電車,然而通過他們的談話片段和幾個舉動便幾乎得知一切」。
Profile Image for Ally Yang.
1,266 reviews28 followers
August 26, 2025
[2025.08.26_125]

故事裡充斥著太多看不懂的事:竟然有的摩托車比賽,沒去過的布拉格街道,過目即忘的煉鋼廠工作流程,不認識的足球明星,之類的。赫拉巴爾把「不受人重視的第四等級」市井小民平凡人的平凡人生寫得既親切又有趣,〈晚間培訓〉裡對(騎)機車狂熱的父親、〈單調無聊的下午〉裡眼睛離不開書的小夥子、〈巴蒂斯貝克先生之死〉裡好色又貪吃的主教,作者用感興趣的眼光,┬獨特含有大量閒聊的 pábitel 筆調,細細雕琢這些眾生相,密集堆疊的話語、喧囂的機械引擎……等等一陣熱鬧,旋即歸於平靜。然後這些人,就留在了心底。

〈埃曼尼克〉先生不斷地在跟各式各樣的人聊天,從談話內容可以得知,他心思細膩地關心著所有的人,是其中最討喜的人物。



【系美贈書】
Profile Image for Pj Hsiao.
2 reviews
Read
July 30, 2011
「像是坐夜行列車,我們片斷地窺見了旁人微微發光的人生 底層的珍珠」這的確是最佳的註腳....

非常北京的捷克短篇小說.
Displaying 1 - 19 of 19 reviews

Can't find what you're looking for?

Get help and learn more about the design.