“It is a book about trusting our own feelings. Why we are not connected to them and what the consequences can be. But mainly it is a book that ‘ is about the path to a complete and authentic life. Such a journey includes unpleasant experiences and emotions, as well as exciting and joyful moments,” said Klára Elšíková, author and also editor of Aktuálně. cz, about her new book called Pacanka.
Who is Pacanka?
A tomboy is a girl who acts like a boy. Growing up with boys, she is bold and brave. That’s why the word “tomboy” exists in English.
In your book, she is a girl who drinks a lot, has, let’s say, a rich sex life and sometimes talks tough. It’s still like things girls don’t or shouldn’t do…
Yes, I wanted to tick those boxes. We still believe that girls have a right to behave a certain way. I wanted to break the idea of what is a real girl and what is not.
Women still need to be good…
For sure. I will be 35 this year and I am surrounded by women who are just at this age starting to gain self-confidence and learn to express their dislikes and likes , from relationships to salary increases perhaps. I think a possible reason is that we are raised in a kind of idea of an ideal girl who should mostly listen, not stand a- out too much and thinking of other people first. As a result, we do not know our limits at all and cannot protect them.
The word boundaries, recognizing and setting them, is mentioned several times in that book…
Yes, it’s a big theme because the main character, like many of us, he sees his limits and learns to set them only during his adult life.
Pacanka drinks a lot, so it seems she doesn’t know her limits. Why is there so much drowning in alcohol?
She is not connected to her inner world. I think it happens to us a lot. We don’t see our needs, and instead of being able to express them and maybe even implement them, we run away from dissatisfaction. We try to escape because we are not good at something.
Last year, I filmed a podcast called Na plech for Aktuální. The topic is alcohol. In each program there were people who knew a little about it. In all of them, we reached the good girl or the good boy syndrome and the fact that they lived in a situation where they were not good. They solved it with alcohol. When they changed their lives, suddenly they didn’t need alcohol. They didn’t need to run anymore.
How does the book Helimadoe fit into this, from which you quote several times in your book?
Helimadoe is for me an essential book. I was at the booth during the covid pandemic. I had nothing to do there, I didn’t have a job, I didn’t have an apartment because I came back from Ukraine. And I borrowed this book from a friend and read it there. I thought Helimadoe really knew something, although it was already published in 1940. The story of Dora, who runs away with a wizard because she wants to live something other than what is traditionally presented as a “good life”, mention me a lot. On the one hand, Pacanka can seem detached and careless, but on the other hand, she thinks in detail about what it should be like.
Pacanka often talks about freedom, for example: “You hold freedom with both hands.” But this is heard at a time when there is a lot of alcohol in it.
I just wanted to show that we often look for freedom in the wrong way. For me personally, it is important that I feel free in my life and live my own way. At the same time, I know that it is not always easy to realize that freedom lies in the inner world. Pacanka travels a lot and you could say that she doesn’t miss freedom, but she always frees herself by drinking. She wants freedom, but she understands in the wrong way. A lot of people are like that. They are at work all week, on Friday they go to rest and feel that they are finally free, but it is not quite the same. Booze doesn’t set us free.
An example from the book Pacanka
You go to the Liberals, there might be some good guys, but when you walk in, you realize there’s no bar. But you don’t want to turn around immediately, you sit down at the table, even if you know people are sitting alone, unlike behind the bar. At the bar, you enjoy solitude, you accept it, you know it’s part of the process, an entry point leading to sex and a good feeling. At the table, you can’t go anywhere from solitude, you just keep yourself there, you have to look at a book or your mobile phone, the table as a shield against: “Hey, are you here alone?” No, you don’t feel like life is good at the table.
As soon as they bring you the wine, you go out to light a cigarette, you rested the canvas with your shopping on the leg of the table, you had to tie the ears of the bag so that the yoghurts wouldn’t fall to the ground A couple is standing next to you, they are drunk, flirting, within an hour the woman will be groaning somewhere in bed, would you like it too? There is no other smoker, you go back to the pub, you have almost finished the wine outside, so you pay and leave. You call Zuzana from work, who lives nearby and she always says you have to go somewhere, but every time you call or text her, no she picks up and she doesn’t answer. When you meet her in more than a year in the city, when you no longer work together, and she says, “We need to go for coffee sometime,” you smile and tell her why she say if she doesn’t mean it.
You’re really glad you don’t care, you don’t want the looks that say you’re packing too much and shouldn’t take it easy.
You pay, throw the heavy cloth with your shopping over your shoulder, smoke a cigar and go upstairs to Kobra, they have a bar there. You pull the table down under the fountains at the bar, plug your ears and order a red wine. When he puts it in front of you, you immediately take it and go outside to smoke, you will love how the red wine washes down the taste of the cigarette in your mouth. There are two guys who speak English smoking a little distance away, you look at them, they look normal, okay, but you don’t say anything yet, you don’t force yourself, yes everything has its time. You go back inside and enjoy sitting alone at the bar, that you can do anything. “I beg you, how does he look,” you hear from his mother, who would definitely go home first to carry the shops and wouldn’t go anywhere, after everything, it’s past nine and dad is waiting at home. no one is waiting for you at home or anywhere else, you don’t need to write to anyone, anything to explain, you would spread your arms as wide as possible if you had to show other people what a big girl you are.
Every reader is always interested to what extent the given book is based on the author and how much it is inspired by his life. I wonder if she was inspired by your travels. Did you get to know Ukraine as you describe it in the book?
The novel is partly inspired by my experiences. And in my own way, I got to know Ukraine as it is described in the book. He was very wild, but also loving. I met some great people there and I remember her well.
With Pacanka, the reader will travel to several places, but he starts in Niozemska. Do you have your own experience with it too?
I lived there for two years. I worked in a bar and cleaned, so of course even those sections are a lot about what I experienced there and how I felt. Often the main idea is that if we go somewhere, something will happen and suddenly we will be happy, but the reality is often different. We will deal with the things we deal with in the Czech Republic s more likely to deal elsewhere. Recently, a woman said to me in the Canary Islands: “Don’t look for paradise here, that paradise is inside you.”
So how much Pacanka is coming out of you?
Like Pacanka, I traveled and experienced something, but it is not an autobiography. But it is true that I also made a lot of steam in a certain period of my life. At one point, it became such a habit. It was normal for you to drink wherever you go or do anything. With the book, I wanted to raise a debate about the extent to which this “steaming” is really normal and “cheap”.
Photo author: Aktuálně.cz
Klára Elšiková
- She studied journalism and cultural studies at Palacký University in Olomouc. In the past she wrote for Forbes, Marianne or A2. Usually outside, when she worked, for example, as manager of the Prague dance group DOT504, with which she toured Europe and participated in major theater festivals (Fringe in Edinburgh).
- She likes to travel, get to know new places and everything related to them. That’s why she lived for two years in Groningen and half a year in Odesa, where she worked behind a bar and taught Czech under the Kyiv Czech Center.
- In 2013, she published the novel Zítra already used by the publishing house Revolver Revue.
- Her second book, Pacanka, is now being published by the publishing house Host
