Der große tschechische Schriftsteller Bohumil Hrabal führte jene burleske Literatur fort, die den braven Soldaten Schwejk hervorbrachte. Dieser Roman hat seit dem ersten Erscheinen Hunderttausende Leser gefunden. Die so komische wie melancholische Geschichte von Díté, dem kleinen Mann, der sich in kriegsbegeisterten Zeiten einzig nach Frieden und Wohlstand sehnt, gilt als Hrabals schönstes und wichtigstes Buch. Verfilmung von Oscar-Preisträger Ji? i Menzel mit Julia Jentsch 2007 in den Kinos!
Ein Dokument des ungebrochenen Mutes. Der tschechische Dramatiker und furchtlose Bürgerrechtler Václav Havel, der 1989 zum Staatspräsidenten seines Landes gewählt wurde, berichtet von privilegierter Kindheit und schwieriger Jugend., von seiner Arbeit am berühmten „Theater am Geländer“, von der ersten Dubcek-Ära und von den Ereignissen, die zur Gründung der Charta 77 führten, von Verfolgungen und Begegnungen. Sein Selbstporträt wird unvermeidlich zur Kritik des politischen, geistigen und kulturellen Geschehens in der CSSR. Es reflektiert die Rolle des Intellektuellen in schwieriger Zeit.
One of the last artistic expressions of life under communism, this novel captures the atmosphere in Prague between 1983 and 1987, where a dance could be broken up by the secret police, a traffic offense could lead to surveillance, and where contraband books were the currency of the underworld.
Václav Havel was born in Prague on October 5, 1936, but faced limited educational opportunities due to his "bourgeois" background. He studied at the Economics Faculty of the Czech Technical University from 1955 to 1957, then began working in theater after compulsory military service. Havel joined Prague's Theater on the Balustrade in 1960, where his plays gained international acclaim. From 1962 to 1966, he studied dramaturgy at the Academy of Performing Arts in Prague and became involved in the Prague Spring reforms, which ended with the Warsaw Pact invasion in August 1968. Opposing the invasion and subsequent hard-line Communist policies, Havel's work was banned in Czechoslovakia in 1969. In 1977, he co-founded the Charter 77 human rights initiative, facing house arrest in 1978-79 and multiple incarcerations for his beliefs. In November 1989, he emerged as a leader of Civic Forum, the movement that helped end Communist rule, and was elected president of Czechoslovakia on December 9, 1989. He was re-elected on July 5, 1990, but resigned on July 20, 1992, as the country approached dissolution. On January 26, 1993, he became the first president of the Czech Republic. Havel's plays, essays, and speeches have been globally performed and translated, earning him numerous international awards.