Zoli

Resource Information

The work Zoli represents a distinct intellectual or artistic creation found in City of Stirling Library Services. This resource is a combination of several types including: Work, Language Material, Books.

Label

Zoli

Creator

• McCann, Colum, 1965-

Author

• McCann, Colum, 1965-

Subject

• Historical fiction
• Romanies -- Fiction
• Czechoslovakia -- Social conditions -- 20th century -- Fiction
• Women poets -- Fiction
• Grandparent and child -- Fiction

Genre

• Historical fiction
• Fiction

Language

eng

Summary

Czechoslovakia in the early 1930s, Zoli, a young Roma girl, is six years old. The fascist Hlinka guards had driven most of her people out onto the frozen lake and forced them to stay there until the spring, when the ice cracked and everyone drowned - Zoli's parents, brothers and sisters. Now she and her grandfather head off in search of a 'company'. Zoli teaches herself to read and write and becomes a singer, a privileged position in a gypsy company as they are viewed as the guardians of gypsy tradition. But Zoli is different because she secretly writes down some of her songs. With the rise of the Nazis, the suppression of the gypsies intensifies. The war ends and with the spread of socialism, the Roma are suddenly regarded as 'comrades' again. Zoli meets Stephen Swann, a man she will have a passionate affair with, but who will also betray her. Zoli is based very loosely on the true story of the Gypsy poet, Papsuza