![]() He helped greatly to spread Samizdat publications, to disseminate information about the anti-communist opposition in the former Czechoslovakia, and to facilitate forbidden contacts.Īnd then came 1989. Mountain Hotel, Largo Desolato or Temptation, Havel became the leading representative of the Chartists and of Czech dissent abroad. Thanks to significant support from abroad, staging the plays he wrote during the Normalization e.g. Neither the persecution nor permanent pressure exerted on Václav Havel during the 1980s quelled his political and literary engagement. In 1979 Václav Havel was sentenced to four and a half years unconditionally for Sedition and after his release came under constant surveillance by State Security. Václav Havel, as the co-author and spokesperson for Charter 77 represented the initiative outward, and punitive measures from officialdom were not far behind. This essentially grassroots initiative criticising on the one hand the ruling party’s imposition of power and on the other invoking the declarations of the Helsinki International Conference upholding human rights became a palpable problem for the Communist regime. The key event was the drafting of Charter 77. From his position of a ‘freelancer’ or labourer in the Trutnov brewery, he maintained his independence, and through several open letters addressed to the leading Communist rulers, he sought to draw attention to the need for respect human rights, as well as to release political prisoners in Czechoslovakia. The invasion of the Warsaw Pact troops on 21 August 1968 brought the end of the political Prague Spring and the beginning of harsh reality for Václav Havel. Moreover, in 1964 he married Olga Šplíchalová, who was to become his mainstay in life. In 1963, the ‘Theatre on the Railing’ put on his play called ‘The Garden Party’ and three years later he published his first book, Protocols. In parallel with his job he studied dramaturgy at the Academy of Performing Arts. He had the opportunity personally to make the acquaintance of Jaroslav Seifert, Vladimír Holan and Jiří Kolář.Įach of these meetings was one more piece of the mosaic toward Václav Havel becoming a writer.Īfter returning from compulsory military service in 1959 he fell under the spell of where he found himself he started work as a stage technician, but during the culturally relaxed Sixties became a playwright and later assistant director. He carried on writing and exploring the world of literature. By that time, he had progressed through his novice literary work and a critical speech at a conference of novice writers in 1956 at Dobříš château. He had to wait many years to continue his studies. The humanities subjects he subsequently opted for at the Charles University were denied him due to his incompatible cadre profile. Together with his brother, he grew up in a loving, inspiring and very active family setting.Īfter February 1948, when the Communists came to power, this businessman’s son was not allowed to study, but after various difficulties eventually managed to graduate from secondary school in 1954 by taking a course of evening classes at the Academic Grammar School. Now and then, poetry and performance take on an exceptional topicality in periods of political crisis, as these ephemeral and flexible art forms enable the reflection of relations and contexts that remain otherwise undiscussed.The last Czechoslovak and first Czech President Václav Havel was born in October 1936 into a major Prague business and intellectual family. ![]() The exhibition presents authors from subcultures in socialist states along with contemporary positions. They did so by drawing attention to the material and medial dimension of language, and by creating performative situations for themselves and their audiences within which possibilities of verbal expression could be tested and acted out. Since the second half of the twentieth century, in particular poets and artists in Eastern Europe have taken up the challenge of reflecting on and investigating the instrumentalization of language for communicative and political-ideological purposes. Damals wie heute gewinnen Poetry & Performance in politischen Krisenzeiten eine besondere Brisanz, da in diesen ephemeren und flexiblen Formen Zusammenhänge behandelt werden können, die ansonsten unbesprochen blieben. Die Ausstellung präsentiert Autor*innen aus den Subkulturen sozialistischer Staaten neben zeitgenössischen Positionen. Sie tun dies mit ästhetischen Mitteln, indem sie die materielle und mediale Dimension der Sprache ins Zentrum der Aufmerksamkeit rücken und für sich und ihr Publikum performative Situationen schaffen, in denen Möglichkeiten sprachlicher Äußerung erprobt, durchgespielt und ausagiert werden. Jahrhunderts stellen sich vor allem Dichter*innen und Künstler*innen in Osteuropa der Herausforderung, die kommunikative und politisch-ideologische Indienstnahme der Sprache zu reflektieren und zu erforschen.
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