Naked Thoughts by Róbert Gál, trans. from the Slovak by David Short

Heralded by Joshua Cohen as “The Aphorism Master,” Róbert Gál revives the forgotten art of the philo-poetic line with vicious wit and tremendous dexterity. Naked Thoughts—his fourth book to be translated into English—is at once incendiary and revelatory, surprising and instinctual, defiant and delicate, and dares to pursue and give expression to those fugitive inspirations of the mind whose very beauty relies on their performance of contention with the structures of meaning by which they are snared and signified. Weighing the balance between the intensity of emotion and patient contemplation, Naked Thoughts is a book that will satisfy voyeurs and arsonists.

Praise for Naked Thoughts

“Róbert Gál continues to keep navigating the narrows of the Aphoristic Straits bound by the peaks Montaigne, Cioran, and @NeinQuarterly. These turbulent waters are not easy to maneuver, but Gál is a master oarsman of the barque of melancholy.”

—Andrei Codrescu, author of The Art of Forgetting

“Here is something really new. Róbert Gál’s archipelago of fragmentary narratives, ruminations, and aphorisms gives us a new kind of reading experience—one marked by disjunction and divergence rather than by linear narrative or structured argument. I’d like to think of Naked Thoughts as a harbinger of a writing to come, unconfined by any of the familiar categories we use to classify our books.”

—Lars Iyer, author of Wittgenstein Jr

“Whether he’s inverting the closing line of Wittgenstein’s Tractatus, upending some cliché, or crafting stark truisms that exude a hard-won simplicity, Róbert Gál’s amusing and pessimistic micro-philosophies are always a rare joy.”

—Gary J. Shipley, author of Warewolff!

Róbert Gál was born in 1968 in Bratislava, Slovakia, and, after a period of study and itinerancy in Trnava, Brno, New York, Jerusalem, and Berlin, currently resides in Prague. He is the author of several books of aphorisms, fiction, and philosophical fragments available in English translation, including Agnomia (Dalkey Archive Press, 2018), On Wing (Dalkey Archive Press, 2015), and Signs & Symptoms (Twisted Spoon Press, 2003).

David Short (b. 1943) taught Czech and Slovak at the School of Slavonic and East European Studies, University College London, from 1973–2011. In addition to academic books in the fields of art, literature, linguistics, and semantics, he has translated many works by modern Czech authors, above all, Bohumil Hrabal. In 2018 he received the Jiří Theiner Award, which recognizes those who significantly help spread and promote Czech literature abroad.

Viktor Kopasz was born in Kráľovský Chlmec, Slovakia in 1973. In the 1990s, he completed photography studies at FAMU in Prague. Since 1989, he’s made visual diaries in which he combines photographs, drawings, and multilingual inscriptions. His book In the Jungle came out in 1999. Two years later, he published a bibliophile edition of Zajetí/Fógság (Captivity), featuring poetry by Jaromír Typlt. Kertelő (The Hedger) followed in 2004, and a bibliophile edition of Uzly (Knots), with Róbert Gál’s aphorisms, in 2013. He lives in Prague.

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