Helena Bochořáková’s wordless novel, Childhood, is the English version of the Czech publication, Z Mého Detství.

Trade edition with dust jacket of Childhood, Bokorakova's 1931 wordless novel.
Trade edition with dust jacket of Childhood,
Bokorakova’s 1931 wordless novel.
  • Title: Childhood: A Cycle Of Woodcuts
  • Author and Illustrator: Helena Bochořáková-Dittrichová
  • Introduction: Arne Novák (about 713 words when translated into English)
  • Publication date: 1931, January
  • Publisher: A. Zwemmer
  • Place of publication: London, England
  • Printer: Fr. Obiznaj Vyskov, (Czechoslovakia)
  • Copyright: artist?
  • Binding: hard cover
  • Language: English titles, etc
  • Unpaginated
  • Printed: recto
  • Edition:
    • 10 copies on hand-made paper, numbered and signed by the artist
    • Trade -300 copies
  • Description:
    • The title page and the Trade cover were done as a woodcut and one can make out the accent marks over Bochořáková Dittrichová in the Czech edition but they are absent in the French and English later editions.
    • Arne Novák did the introduction for this and the original Czech version, Z Meho. Childhood has only 708 words in Novák’s English introduction while he used over 2000 words for the Czech version.
    • The artist used chapter summaries in the French version but has dropped that for this English version ie the Czech and English versions are the same.

The manager of Zwemmer’s bookstore on Charing Cross Road informed me in conversation in 1972 that he remembered the book (Childhood) and the day it arrived in crates from Czechoslovakia. Zwemmer, in fact, had had nothing to do with the publication, and the first they had heard of it was upon opening the crates and seeing their name, with the Z reversed, on the dust jacket. As far as the manager could remember, that was Zwemmer’s first and last communication with Bochorakova-Dittrkhova.


Cohen, Martin S.,
The Novel in Woodcuts: A Handbook;
Journal of Modern Literature Vol 6, No. 2 (Apr., 1977) pp 171 –195

Childhood Ltd – 10 copies on handmade paper

  • Size: ?
  • Dust jacket: Unlikely
  • numbered and signed

NOTE: I have not seen a copy of the Limited edition. If you have information or images please contact me at wn@wordlessnovels.com.

Childhood Trade – 300 copies

  • Size: 6 1/4 x 4 13/16 in; (15.9 x 12.2 cm)
  • Dust jacket: Designed by the artist. NOTE: the “Z” in Zwemmer has been reversed on the DJ to read “S”. This has been corrected on the title page.
  • Signed copies: it is possible to find signed copies of the trade edition but the lack of a signature is not a deficiency, that is how it was published.
Front and back of the dust jacket for Childhood, Bokorakova's 1931 wordless novel.
Front and back of the dust jacket for Childhood,
Bokorakova’s 1931 wordless novel.
The paper boards of Childhood, Bockorakova's 1931 wordless novel. The medallion on the book cover is smaller than the medallion on the DJ.
The paper boards of Childhood, Bockorakova’s
1931 wordless novel. The medallion on the book
cover is smaller than the medallion on the DJ.
Limitation page facing the title page of Bochorakova's 1931 wordless novel, Childhood. Only the 10 special copies need to be signed.
Limitation page facing the title page of Bochorakova’s
1931 wordless novel, Childhood. Only the 10
special copies need to be signed.
Limitation page of Bochorakova's 1931 wordless novel, Childhood.
Limitation page of Bochorakova’s
1931 wordless novel, Childhood.

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