Václav Havel

The figure of dissident, politician, playwright and President Václav Havel is well known around the world today. He entered Czech history books during the Prague Spring of 1968, but most notably became the leading representative of Charter 77 and the November events of 1989.

* 5. 10. 1936 – Prague
† 18. 12. 2011 – Hrádeček (Vlčice)

The last Czechoslovak and first Czech President Václav Havel was born in October 1936 into a major Prague business and intellectual family. Together with his brother, he grew up in a loving, inspiring and very active family setting.

After 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. The humanities subjects he subsequently opted for at the Charles University were denied him due to his incompatible cadre profile. He had to wait many years to continue his studies. 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 carried on writing and exploring the world of literature. He had the opportunity personally to make the acquaintance of Jaroslav Seifert, Vladimír Holan and Jiří Kolář.

Each of these meetings was one more piece of the mosaic toward Václav Havel becoming a writer.
After 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. In parallel with his job he studied dramaturgy at the Academy of Performing Arts. 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. Moreover, in 1964 he married Olga Šplíchalová, who was to become his mainstay in life.

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. 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 key event was the drafting of Charter 77. 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. Václav Havel, as the co-author and spokesperson for Charter 77 represented the initiative outward, and punitive measures from officialdom were not far behind. 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.

Neither the persecution nor permanent pressure exerted on Václav Havel during the 1980s quelled his political and literary engagement. Thanks to significant support from abroad, staging the plays he wrote during the Normalization e.g. Mountain Hotel, Largo Desolato or Temptation, Havel became the leading representative of the Chartists and of Czech dissent abroad. He helped greatly to spread Samizdat publications, to disseminate information about the anti-communist opposition in the former Czechoslovakia, and to facilitate forbidden contacts.

And then came 1989. In January, Václav Havel was, naturally enough, involved with Palach Week, which meant another jail term. Yet the subsequent European events, such as the collapse of the pro-Soviet bloc, the fall of the Berlin Wall, Prague’s 17th November, the Velvet Revolution in Czechoslovakia and the rise of the Civic Forum paved the way for political negotiations that brought Václav Havel into a completely new role – on 29 December 1989 he became President of the Republic. In this capacity and during very complicated changes and processes of democracy building, Václav Havel carried on for nearly thirteen years.