CURRENT MISSION

To keep breathing

ABOUT ME

I´m a PhD student of English and American literature and a translator from English into Czech. I teach at my home university and I´m enjoying every bit of it. I love talking about literature and discussing the various impacts it has on people. As a translator I work mostly with British and American fiction and also with literature about film.
The thing I´ve enjoyed the most recently is travelling. I seem to have a strange passion for cold and rainy places (to the disappointment of my friends and my boyfriend). My favourite destination so far is Scottish islands - Orkney, Shetland and the Hebrides - which nicely combines with a (healthy) affection for Scottish malts.

PHILOSOPHY

"Ordinary life is pretty complex stuff."
- Harvey Pekar

Why I’m on Couchsurfing

COUCHSURFING EXPERIENCE

I was introduced to CS by my boyfriend who has hosted some 90 people so far and I became enthusiastic very quickly. I´ve hosted people with my boyfriend and surfed in England, Scotland, Iceland, United States and Hawaii and am really glad to be a part of this amazing project. The idea of people being nice to each other is so simple, yet so ingenious..

Interests

Literature, film, photography, travelling, hitchhiking, sleeping outside, drawing, teasing my cat, teasing my parents, spending time with people who can make you feel at home, spending time with people who you can be silent with..

• cats
• literature
• poetry
• photography
• festivals
• wine
• traveling
• drawing
• languages
• hitchhiking

Music, Movies, and Books

My students say that in every short story I give them to read, somebody dies. Yep. I like heavy stuff but usually mixed with humour (equally dark). My favourites would be Nathanael West, Horace McCoy, Bernard Malamud, Flannery O´Connor, John Cheever, Tobias Wolff, Tim O´Brien, Joseph Heller, Jonathan Safran Foer and many others, of course.
My PhD thesis is on American noir fiction, which includes the hardboiled crime fiction from the 1930s (Raymond Chandler, Dashiell Hammett, James M. Cain,...). I´ve always had a soft spot for detective stories.
Recently I´ve developed an addiction to graphic novels (no scifi stuff, though) - my champion so far is Seth and his book "It´s A Good Life If You Don´t Weaken".

Movies: usually dark and/or funny - esp. the Coen brothers, David Lynch, Ingmar Bergman, ..., and old American movies - with Humphrey Bogart, Lauren Bacall, James Dean, James Cagney, Marilyn Monroe, Sterling Hayden, ..., FILM NOIR

Music: I like discovering new things. Recent highlights: Icelandic music (Mugison, Sigur Rós, Pétur Ben, Múm,...), Scottish fusion (Martyn Bennett, Peatbog Faeries, Shooglenifty), Psapp, Adam Green, Noir Désir, ..., jazz, throat singing from the republic of Tuva

One Amazing Thing I’ve Done

Helping to bring into life an international poetry festival in my hometown.
Driving through the Icelandic countryside (and then bumping into a wine store, but that´s another story).

Countries I’ve Visited

Austria, Croatia, France, Germany, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Montenegro, Poland, Slovakia, Spain, Turkey, United Kingdom, United States, Viet Nam

Countries I’ve Lived In

Czech Republic, United States

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