Description
Jáchym Topol – The Devil's Workshop
The Czech city of Terezín was formerly a concentration camp where tens of thousands of people were tortured to death. Now it is a ghost town, abandoned by everyone. But Lebon, a citizen devoted to Terezín, intends to preserve the city as it was, turning it into a Holocaust museum, saving every wall, every floorboard, every cellar, every inscription on the walls. However, the noble desire to preserve the past soon turns into a profitable business, where horror is sold as a spectacle and memory as a commodity. When the novel's protagonist is forced to create a similar museum in Belarus, in places of forgotten genocides, the story takes on a satirical, dark, and phantasmagoric tension, where human suffering is easily transformed into a commercial brand. This is a grotesque, blackly humorous anti-utopia, a powerful contrast between universal tragedy and humanity.
The Czech city of Terezín was formerly a concentration camp where tens of thousands of people were tortured to death. Now it is a ghost town, abandoned by everyone. But Lebon, a citizen devoted to Terezín, intends to preserve the city as it was, turning it into a Holocaust museum, saving every wall, every floorboard, every cellar, every inscription on the walls. However, the noble desire to preserve the past soon turns into a profitable business, where horror is sold as a spectacle and memory as a commodity. When the novel's protagonist is forced to create a similar museum in Belarus, in places of forgotten genocides, the story takes on a satirical, dark, and phantasmagoric tension, where human suffering is easily transformed into a commercial brand. This is a grotesque, blackly humorous anti-utopia, a powerful contrast between universal tragedy and humanity.
| Title in Armenian | Յախիմ Տոպոլ – Սատանայի արհեստանոցը |
|---|---|
| Author(s) | Jáchym Topol |
| Translator(s) | Mariam Mansuryan |
| Language(s) | Armenian |
| Publisher(s) | Newmag |
| Year | 2026 |
| Pages | 216 |
| Binding | Hardcover |
| Size | 14.5 x 22.3 cm |
| ISBN | 9789939482118 |
Յախիմ Տոպոլ, Սատանայի արհեստանոցը, Jáchym Topol, Chladnou zemí, Newmag, novel, fiction, Czech literature, Holocaust, satire, anti-utopia