Emil Hakl

Emil Hakl (aka Jan Beneš), a fiction writer and a poet, was born in Prague in 1958. After graduating from the Jaroslav Ježek Conservatorium, he worked as a copywriter and as the editor of the literary magazine Tvar. In the late eighties, Hakl founded an informal literary group called Moderní analfabet. Hakl made his literary debut with two collections of poetry, followed shortly by a collection of stories entitled Konec sveta (2001). Since then Hakl has written a novel , Intimní schránka Sabriny Black (2002), a novella O rodicích a detech (2002), and another collection of stories O létajících objektech (2004). Hakl’s fiction is set in a Prague inhabited by intriguing characters that speak the language of the city’s pubs and bars. Emil Hakl won the distinguished Magnesia Litera Prize for his novel O rodicích a detech, which in 2008 was adapted into a film.