My Seven Lives is the English translation of the best-selling memoir of Slovak journalist Agnesa Kalinova (1924-2014): Holocaust survivor, film critic, translator, and political prisoner. An oral history written with her colleague Jana Juranova My Seven Lives provides a window into Jewish history, the Holocaust, and the cultural evolution of Central and Eastern Europe. The conversational approach gives the book a relatable immediacy that vividly conveys the tone and temperament of Agnesa, bringing out her lively personality and extraordinary ability to stay positive in the face of adversity. Each chapter reflects a distinct period of Agnesa's long and tumultuous life. Her idyllic childhood gives way to the rise of Nazism and restrictions of the anti-Jewish legislation, which led to deportations and her escape to Hungary, where she found refuge in a Budapest convent. Surviving the Holocaust, she returned to Slovakia and married writer J?in Ladislav Kalina. They embraced communism, and Agnesa began her career as a journalist and film critic and became involved in the Prague Spring, ending with the Soviet-led invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968. Agnesa and her husband lost their jobs and were imprisoned, which led to their decision to immigrate to West Germany. She found a new career as a political commentator for Radio Free Europe, and after decades of political oppression, Agnesa lived to see the euphoric days of the Velvet Revolution and its freeing aftermath. My Seven Lives shows the impact of an often brutal twentieth century on the life of one remarkable individual. It's a story of survival, perseverance, and ultimately triumph.
Jana Juranova cofounded the feminist educational and publication project ASPEKT, where she remains a coordinator and editor. She has translated over twenty books from English, including Three Guineas by Virginia Woolf, Gender Trouble by Judith Butler, and Trauma and Recovery by Judith Herman. She is a playwright and author of children's books and literary fiction. Her novel Nani?ihodnica (The Wretch) was published in 2020. She has been nominated three times for Slovakia's most prestigious literary award, Anasoft Litera. For My Seven Lives both authors were awarded the Egon Erwin Kisch Prize in Prague. In 2018 Juranova received a state prize for her literary activities and the promotion of human rights and democracy from the president of the Slovak Republic. Agnesa Kalinova (1924-2014) was a journalist and translator. Born into a Jewish family in Pre?iov in eastern Slovakia, she lost most of her extended family in the Holocaust while she survived by hiding in a convent in Budapest. After the war she embarked on a career as journalist and film critic, serving for many years as an editor with the cultural and political weekly Kult??rny ?Yivot. As supporters of the Prague Spring, Agnesa and her husband lost their jobs following the Soviet-led invasion of Czechoslovakia and were imprisoned in 1972. She later immigrated with her husband and daughter to West Germany, where she became a political commentator for Radio Free Europe. She died in Munich a few weeks after her ninetieth birthday.
Preface 1. Childhood and Adolescence 1924-1942 2. War-Deportations-Escape-Return 1942-1945 3. Bratislava After the War 1945-1956 4. From Oppression to Freedom and Back Again 1956-1969 5. Normalization and Emigration 1969-1978 6. Exile 1978-1990 7. Returns 1990-1995 What Happened Next Farewell to Agnesa Kalinova Appendix: Biographical Notes on Selected Individuals Mentioned Notes Index
"This book is not a conventional autobiography, but takes the form - commonly used in Central Europe - of a transcribed dialogue between the subject and a friendly interlocutor [...] As impressive as Kalinova's recall of names and events is her lack of bitterness. Refusing to let herself be defined by the loss of family in the Holocaust and of her career in middle age, she says: "I've always regarded life as a kind of adventure: let's see what it throws at me and how things will pan out."" - Times Literary Supplement
