Eda Kriseová speaks at Prague Spring 50

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04/12/2018 Added

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Eda Kriseová gives her talk "Frozen Spring" at Prague Spring 50. https://praguespring50.unl.edu/speakers#eda-kriseova

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[00:00:11.083]"To this day, I cannot understand
[00:00:13.377]"how I could have known this is so disregarded
[00:00:17.487]"the political and social events in the beginning of 1968
[00:00:23.067]"for what they were."
[00:00:25.197]"I had my first sweet child of three months
[00:00:30.247]"and I was on maternity leave,
[00:00:32.487]"enchanted with my new role as a mother.
[00:00:36.807]"It was on May 1st, International Workers Day,
[00:00:40.237]"as I remember, I realized that something
[00:00:43.337]"truly revolutionary was happening.
[00:00:46.800]"There was a change,
[00:00:48.561]"which as major changes usually come about,
[00:00:53.417]"crapped on the dove's feet as my favorite philosopher,
[00:00:57.777]"Friedrich Nietzsche has written.
[00:01:03.187]"It could not escape my attention
[00:01:05.737]"that in only a few months, the nation,
[00:01:08.127]"which had previously been angry,
[00:01:10.707]"indifferent, grumpy, and skeptical,
[00:01:13.597]"suddenly began rejoicing in the streets.
[00:01:18.457]"This time, people joined the May 1st procession
[00:01:22.197]"which previously had been mandatory
[00:01:25.179]"of their own free will and they smiled up
[00:01:30.057]"to the major dignitaries
[00:01:33.257]"on the podium on Wenceslas Square.
[00:01:36.937]"People held hands, encouraging them
[00:01:39.757]"and paying their respects by giving a thumbs up,
[00:01:45.253]"a sign Alexander Dubcek was the first Secretary
[00:01:47.977]"of the Central Committee
[00:01:49.807]"of the ruling Communist Party of Czechoslovakia,
[00:01:52.707]"and we had a new president, General Ludvik Svoboda.
[00:01:57.757]"Novotny, the previous president, had to resign.
[00:02:02.800]"Censorship was spontaneously fading away
[00:02:07.277]"and people were assembling together as they pleased.
[00:02:13.267]"On the Editorial Board of Mlady Svet, Young World,
[00:02:16.917]"where I had returned to work as a journalist and editor,
[00:02:21.418]"there reigned a festive and excited atmosphere.
[00:02:26.107]"I was sent immediately to one district town
[00:02:29.057]"to write about the local process of renewal.
[00:02:33.417]"I went to meetings organized by students
[00:02:36.427]"where we spoke with both higher
[00:02:38.447]"and lower Communist Party functionaries.
[00:02:42.137]"They were friendly and joyful,
[00:02:57.058]"even to the point of talking behind the backs of those
[00:03:02.991]"who were not present and making silly jokes.
[00:03:08.447]"When someone would ask
[00:03:12.297]"about something definite from the past,
[00:03:16.327]"they spoke of mistakes that had been made,
[00:03:21.187]"and how they were now going to set everything right.
[00:03:26.117]"They reveled in the newfound popularity
[00:03:32.947]"now that for the first time in their lives
[00:03:36.057]"someone was taking them seriously
[00:03:38.487]"and they promised that from now on,
[00:03:41.247]"everything would be different.
[00:03:44.477]"'Comrades'.
[00:03:47.337]"There would be plenty of need.
[00:03:49.047]"The first Secretary and President of Czechoslovakia
[00:03:51.867]"Novotny had proclaimed several years ago
[00:03:54.687]"from the tribunal, and there was.
[00:03:59.377]"In the Spring of 1968, we were promised democracy.
[00:04:03.627]"A well-functioning economy, justice,
[00:04:06.867]"and correction of wrongdoing, rehabilitation, and freedom.
[00:04:12.337]"I didn't even mind that these promises were being made
[00:04:15.577]"by the very same communist
[00:04:17.247]"who had introduced socialism to us
[00:04:20.117]"and had constructed it.
[00:04:23.307]"Now, they wished to reform their work
[00:04:25.737]"by giving it a human face.
[00:04:30.337]"But I remember the violence of the past
[00:04:33.297]"like the brutal collectivization,
[00:04:36.177]"the expropriation of farms and land.
[00:04:40.407]"A farmer who we used to visit on each Summer holiday
[00:04:45.109]"shot our beloved watch dog because,
[00:04:49.887]"as he told us with tears in his eyes,
[00:04:52.557]"there was nothing to watch over anymore.
[00:04:57.807]"On a neighboring farm, a farmer was labored at gulag
[00:05:03.577]"and jailed under suspicion
[00:05:07.110]"that he was set to have a transmitter in the attic
[00:05:10.517]"of which he sent messages to the enemies
[00:05:13.937]"of socialism to the imperialists.
[00:05:18.277]"His daughters were my friends,
[00:05:20.897]"and they said that it must have been peering doves
[00:05:25.317]"who were nesting under the roof.
[00:05:27.877]"My grandmother was evicted from her flat
[00:05:31.207]"in the Prague Old Town.
[00:05:33.037]"The flat was then occupied
[00:05:34.647]"by a communist dignitary from Moravia.
[00:05:38.437]"My best school chum's father was jailed
[00:05:42.457]"and hanged during the Slansky Trials,
[00:05:46.617]"the Stalin-inspirational trials of 1952.
[00:05:52.797]"I knew that we lived behind barbed wire,
[00:05:58.817]"and that those who tried to escape to the west
[00:06:02.483]"would be shot by border guards.
[00:06:05.527]"I actually saw the barbed wire for the first time in 1965
[00:06:12.247]"when they began to allow us to visit the west.
[00:06:16.477]"We exchanged our Czech crowns
[00:06:18.547]"for 10 American dollars only by person.
[00:06:21.817]"They would not allow us to take more than that,
[00:06:25.417]"and they sent us on our way with remarks such as this,
[00:06:29.507]"'Go and beg something from the German
[00:06:32.266]"or American imperialists, let them take care of you.'
[00:06:40.197]"In 1965, I immediately went
[00:06:45.320]"to a work camp in Turkey.
[00:06:47.297]"Together with American Quakers,
[00:06:49.077]"we built a laundry facility in the middle of a high plain.
[00:06:54.247]"I preferred not to go to Western Europe
[00:06:57.297]"since there I would be a beggar.
[00:06:59.967]"In the camp,
[00:07:04.361]"we worked for our food
[00:07:06.547]"and I did not have to explain to anyone
[00:07:09.890]"that I was not an indoctrinated communist ideal.
[00:07:15.477]"As a volunteer, I went to Japan
[00:07:17.814]"on a on a recultivation project
[00:07:20.647]"and then I worked in a kibbutz in Israel."
[00:07:25.097]"In the 1950s, the communists had unleashed real terror.
[00:07:29.127]"People disappeared without a trace.
[00:07:31.197]"Innocent people were sentenced, even tortured,
[00:07:33.727]"until they would finally confess to all the charges
[00:07:36.047]"of which they were accused.
[00:07:38.407]"The innocent were sentenced to death in show trials
[00:07:40.907]"that targeted traitors and revisionists.
[00:07:43.319]"In the 1950s, communists spread terror and fear
[00:07:47.727]"which was transmitted to my generation,
[00:07:49.814]"even though we were unable
[00:07:51.287]"to make decisions about anything.
[00:07:53.617]"In their minds, people returned
[00:07:55.247]"to the time of the Nazi protectorate.
[00:07:57.947]"The fears and anxieties of our parents penetrated our minds
[00:08:01.247]"so that we were unable to rid our minds of those thoughts.
[00:08:05.157]"In the 1960s, by way of contrast,
[00:08:07.614]"were the times of our youth.
[00:08:09.927]"Repression eased a new generation,
[00:08:12.177]"my own generation, was forming
[00:08:14.647]"in opposition to all the regulations,
[00:08:18.257]"threats, harassments, and persecutions.
[00:08:21.887]"We were not like the communist youth,
[00:08:23.777]"Marxists and communists who denounced their schoolmates
[00:08:27.757]"who held opinions which differed from their own.
[00:08:30.689]"At the end of the 1950s, social structures revived
[00:08:34.477]"and social life was reborn and began to exist on its own.
[00:08:38.777]"Society had to transform itself from the grassroots up
[00:08:42.317]"and to wait for suitable moments to act.
[00:08:44.983]"People began to gather together on cultural platforms
[00:08:49.327]"and they exerted political pressure
[00:08:51.117]"on behalf of what real life required.
[00:08:53.987]"The official culture was of no interest to them.
[00:08:56.886]"Eventually, they began to explore their own possibilities
[00:09:01.237]"as much as they were able.
[00:09:03.027]"They established their own publishing houses
[00:09:05.067]"for banned authors, they read forbidden authors.
[00:09:08.277]"The sought out forbidden thoughts
[00:09:09.847]"in the banned book sections of their libraries.
[00:09:12.797]"They smuggled manuscripts abroad.
[00:09:15.357]"The process of freeing oneself started in small theaters.
[00:09:19.957]"From the theater stage, people heard
[00:09:21.947]"what they were unable to say in public.
[00:09:24.257]"In the semi darkness of the theater,
[00:09:26.087]"they reacted spontaneously.
[00:09:28.104]"It was no longer ideological theater,
[00:09:31.027]"a theater that was moralizing
[00:09:32.727]"and which showed hot timely topics.
[00:09:35.445]"At this time, Vaclav Havel began writing absurd dramas
[00:09:40.097]"and the Czech New Wave appeared in film.
[00:09:42.881]"Political prisoners who had been sentenced
[00:09:45.297]"in the 1950s were released.
[00:09:47.627]"Books which could not be published 10 years earlier
[00:09:50.127]"now appeared in print and every Thursday morning,
[00:09:53.047]"we joined the queues in front of the book shops.
[00:09:55.868]"Vaclav Havel was not only a successful playwright
[00:09:59.347]"in Na zábradlí Theater,
[00:10:01.897]"but he was also on the Editorial Board of Tvar,
[00:10:05.227]"a monthly magazine of Writers Union.
[00:10:08.117]"This magazine bravely fought for its existence
[00:10:10.887]"with the Central Committee
[00:10:12.137]"of the Czechoslovak Communist Party
[00:10:14.257]"and with all who were in power.
[00:10:16.427]"A new generation was being formed,
[00:10:18.736]"all the polemics and disputes,
[00:10:21.185]"and they embraced the political engagement.
[00:10:24.867]"In the Writers Union,
[00:10:26.237]"communist writers criticized the system
[00:10:28.950]"and thus a process of reform began.
[00:10:32.287]"This introduced a time of resolutions and abdications.
[00:10:35.989]"Critical writers were readmitted to the communists parties,
[00:10:39.337]"even those who had been executed in the 1950s.
[00:10:42.787]"At the party's Central Committee meeting,
[00:10:44.877]"a new government was named,
[00:10:46.427]"consisting of only reformed communists."
[00:10:50.867]"I was young and critical, I became a reporter,
[00:10:57.305]"eventually winning the most popular reporter ever
[00:11:00.647]"of Mlady Svet magazine.
[00:11:03.197]"At this time in the Spring of 1968,
[00:11:06.797]"I also became publishing in the weekly--
[00:11:09.533](speaking foreign language)
[00:11:11.047]"This journal was published by the Writers Union
[00:11:14.107]"and was even more critical than Mlady Svet.
[00:11:18.797]"My articles were called asocialism and I reported
[00:11:26.220]"on the hard and illegal work of women
[00:11:29.237]"in heavy industry and on night shifts.
[00:11:32.727]"I wrote about homes for retired people
[00:11:36.410]"with titles like, What a Good Living We Shall Have."
[00:11:42.202](speaking foreign language)
[00:11:44.257]"Journalists were concerned with discovering new topics,
[00:11:47.697]"dismantling old secrets, and one scandal flowed another.
[00:11:52.987]"Newspapers attracted new readership
[00:11:56.087]"and people eagerly watched television
[00:11:58.507]"and listened to the radio more than ever before."
[00:12:03.827]"Freedom of the press came about spontaneously
[00:12:06.247]"but it was only legalized by the National Assembly in June.
[00:12:09.897]"The press, radio, and television
[00:12:11.997]"criticized societal illusions.
[00:12:14.517]"People learned about the shot trials,
[00:12:16.197]"executions, and activities of the secret police
[00:12:19.477]"and about the benefits
[00:12:20.507]"which communist functionaries received.
[00:12:23.117]"The new program of the communist party was published.
[00:12:25.760]"The general public was pleased,
[00:12:28.067]"and there were no calls for revenge or retaliation.
[00:12:30.887]"Ardent supporters of socialism,
[00:12:33.443]"those party members who enjoyed a good living,
[00:12:36.017]"began to rebel against these new orders.
[00:12:38.271]"Economists were promising people
[00:12:40.747]"that they would administer the state better
[00:12:43.207]"and that they promised trade unions and worker's councils
[00:12:46.893]"that would involve workers more in their work
[00:12:50.197]"and that they would be rewarded for it.
[00:12:53.882]"They wished to remove authoritarian leadership
[00:12:57.347]"and replace it with economic models concerned
[00:13:00.277]"with profits, prices, taxes, and competition.
[00:13:03.857]"They wished to replace the bureaucratic machinery.
[00:13:06.937]"Those enterprises which produced at a loss were
[00:13:09.919]"to be either closed down or modernized.
[00:13:13.017]"Small private enterprises would again be allowed to exist.
[00:13:18.037]"Another reform idea that was introduced
[00:13:20.917]"in the party program was cooperation
[00:13:23.017]"with foreign capitalist companies
[00:13:25.237]"in order to reinforce competition.
[00:13:27.719]"They proposed a free and convertible currency.
[00:13:31.767]"People believed in this new government plan.
[00:13:33.987]"A public collection, the Fund for the Republic,
[00:13:36.817]"or Fond Republike, was started
[00:13:39.843]"to which people donated money, gold, and jewelry.
[00:13:43.547]"In two weeks time, the fund collected 159 million crowns
[00:13:48.937]"and 40 kilograms of gold.
[00:13:51.507]"The party, which had never doubted its leading role,
[00:13:54.587]"was now part of a greater reform movement.
[00:13:57.827]"As totalitarian power retreats from its monopoly of power,
[00:14:02.357]"it begins to crumble like a brick wall
[00:14:04.487]"when a single brick is pulled out.
[00:14:06.739]"The reform program, designed by reformers,
[00:14:10.077]"only reacted to shifts in public opinion.
[00:14:12.877]"Reconfirmation of the party's
[00:14:14.787]"new leading role persuaded no one.
[00:14:17.727]"Only the rhetoric was softer.
[00:14:20.337]"The old communists, however, grew fearful,
[00:14:23.887]"especially as journalists pointed
[00:14:25.707]"to deep economic and social problems,
[00:14:28.297]"and as they wrote about the crimes of communism.
[00:14:31.507]"New groups and associations were formed
[00:14:33.867]"and society became more open and democratic.
[00:14:37.456]"Party leaders reacted to the radicalization
[00:14:40.397]"by speeding up the reform process
[00:14:44.958]"and supporting and defending those
[00:14:46.587]"who spoke about counter revolution.
[00:14:49.686]"Our politicians were pretending
[00:14:51.487]"to be saviors of the nation.
[00:14:53.297]"But even though they had the confidence of the people,
[00:14:55.887]"they lied to them instead.
[00:14:57.478]"They told us, 'We are with you, so you should be with us,'
[00:15:01.866]"their deceitful slogan.
[00:15:03.676]"At the very same time, these party leaders were speaking
[00:15:07.237]"with Soviet leaders and they knew
[00:15:08.947]"the Soviet intentions well,
[00:15:10.955]"that save socialism and our land at any cost.
[00:15:14.510]"Alexander Dubcek and the other leaders were unable
[00:15:18.467]"to rid themselves of their illusions
[00:15:20.227]"about the nature of the Soviet socialism.
[00:15:23.452]"In June 1968, socialist-built armies
[00:15:28.697]"conducted their military maneuvers in our land.
[00:15:31.987]"Conservative communists who had lost
[00:15:34.217]"their leading position complained to Moscow.
[00:15:37.207]"The press and The Warsaw Pact countries wrote openly
[00:15:40.857]"of counter revolution in Czechoslovakia.
[00:15:43.915]"People were fearful, but they still had confidence
[00:15:47.017]"in the country's leadership.
[00:15:48.635]"At the last meeting on the Slovakian and Ukrainian border,
[00:15:52.487]"the Soviet delegation claimed
[00:15:54.207]"that in the Second World War,
[00:15:55.957]"they had lost 20 million lives defending Czechoslovakia
[00:15:59.357]"and they were not about to give it up to NATO
[00:16:01.517]"or to Czechoslovakia right-wingers.
[00:16:04.161]"At the beginning of August,
[00:16:05.773]"Dubcek had held talks in Bratislava
[00:16:09.233]"and declared that there was no reason
[00:16:11.857]"for fear or loss of sovereignty,
[00:16:14.157]"but he kept quiet about a second agreement
[00:16:16.767]"which spoke of the united duty of all socialist countries
[00:16:20.617]"to defend socialism in each individual country.
[00:16:25.697]"Reformed communists were fearful of losing popularity
[00:16:28.837]"which they considered a healing balm for their party
[00:16:31.477]"in ideological wounds from the past.
[00:16:34.527]"To show Soviet socialism without its ideological illusions
[00:16:39.507]"would be seen as sacrilege.
[00:16:41.457]"They needed to rehabilitate themselves,
[00:16:44.137]"which is why they needed to rehabilitate socialism.
[00:16:49.027]"And to this end, they sacrificed the last shreds
[00:16:51.447]"of their country's independence.
[00:16:54.798]"Party leaders were still resolving the party's relationship
[00:16:59.627]"to its doctrines, practices, and ideals,
[00:17:01.967]"but they were not really interested
[00:17:03.287]"in how the party related to society.
[00:17:05.877]"They wanted to continue to rule but didn't know what to do.
[00:17:09.287]"Military resistance would be too risky.
[00:17:11.897]"Party leaders could argue that the army was ready to fight,
[00:17:15.407]"but those who were willing to fight,
[00:17:16.857]"even at the cost of their lives,
[00:17:18.777]"were ordered not to fight by these same party leaders.
[00:17:22.012]"From a historical perspective,
[00:17:24.022]"defeat was considered to be less harmful
[00:17:26.684]"than capitulating without putting up a fight.
[00:17:30.812]"Once again, the lack of responsibility and small-mindedness
[00:17:34.467]"of Czechoslovakian politicians was apparent to all.
[00:17:38.107]"Being dedicated subjects to our traditional choice,
[00:17:40.966]"wrote (accent drowns out name) in his book,"
[00:17:44.665](speaking foreign language)
[00:17:47.640]Sorry.
[00:17:49.334]Kinda butchered that. (speaking foreign language)
[00:17:51.230]And the name is Petr Pithart.
[00:17:54.847]"I quote again from this well known
[00:17:56.617]"Czech political scientist,
[00:17:58.697]"'The choice of primitive demagoguery
[00:18:00.967]"in the threatening situation rather than the range
[00:18:03.597]"of defensive options is a stereotype of Czech politics.'
[00:18:08.907]"On August 21st, the Warsaw Pact,
[00:18:11.247]"an army of five countries, invaded Czechoslovakia.
[00:18:14.867]"The communist party leaders were taken to Moscow.
[00:18:17.687]"In Moscow, all except Frantisek Kriegel signed their names
[00:18:22.580]"to the disgraceful protocol that justified this invasion.
[00:18:27.077]"During the six days before their
[00:18:28.737]"political leaders returned from Moscow,
[00:18:31.197]"Czechs and Slovaks were without leadership.
[00:18:34.348]"People undertook smart and witty measures of resistance.
[00:18:38.043]"Non politicians were even more courageous than politicians.
[00:18:42.197]"Politicians underestimated crafty Czech hands and brains.
[00:18:46.262]"We may question whether an isolated attempt
[00:18:48.947]"to democratize a political system
[00:18:51.377]"either gradually or in a radical way
[00:18:53.775]"would actually have succeeded.
[00:18:56.040]"In the spring of 1968, changes were announced
[00:19:00.297]"but there were no political power
[00:19:02.037]"to put them into practice.
[00:19:04.047]"I think we should have expressed our determination
[00:19:06.797]"to use all means to defend ourselves
[00:19:08.937]"since the geographical location
[00:19:10.817]"of our country was to our advantage.
[00:19:13.447]"Possibly, we could have defended ourselves,
[00:19:15.537]"even if it had not come to open conflict.
[00:19:19.407]"After all, Romania and Yugoslavia
[00:19:21.987]"had not allowed the armies of their allies
[00:19:24.557]"to enter their lands.
[00:19:26.157]"Tiny Vietnam had fought bravely
[00:19:28.027]"against The United States for several years.
[00:19:31.177]"Perhaps the reformed communists
[00:19:33.697]"would have capitulated anyway
[00:19:35.825]"since they were unsure of how to deal
[00:19:38.237]"with this burst of freedom.
[00:19:40.737]"And what would have happened
[00:19:41.697]"if there had been no military invasion?
[00:19:44.647]"Supplies were exhausted, the economy was almost bankrupt,
[00:19:48.827]"a sad and barely qualified leadership existed.
[00:19:52.127]"In as much as each boss was a communist first of all
[00:19:55.587]"with skills and abilities of only secondary importance.
[00:19:59.987]"The gray economy flourished.
[00:20:02.627]"Consumers could obtain everything
[00:20:04.217]"that was not available in the stores on the black market.
[00:20:07.547]"People were stealing from and cheating a state
[00:20:09.987]"which they did not consider to be their own.
[00:20:12.440]"Enormous technological and building projects
[00:20:15.307]"with no useful purpose were constructed.
[00:20:18.697]"Socialism revealed itself to be a luxury
[00:20:21.337]"which we could no longer afford.
[00:20:23.848]"Why are Czech politicians so small-minded and cowardly?
[00:20:28.017]"Why do they give up so easily?
[00:20:30.377]"Historically, they were always submissive
[00:20:32.377]"to foreign powers, Austria, Germany,
[00:20:34.797]"Russia, and mostly recently, China.
[00:20:37.215]"They were always seeking a powerful protector
[00:20:39.725]"who in 1938 betrayed them in the Munich Agreement.
[00:20:45.276]"I think that this probably contributed to the fact
[00:20:47.947]"that many Czech and Slovak peoples voted
[00:20:50.047]"for the communists after the Second World War in 1947.
[00:20:54.687]"Even today, we do not believe
[00:20:56.747]"that our state really belongs to us
[00:20:58.747]"as a community for which we bare responsibility
[00:21:02.017]"and we lack the ability to find allies
[00:21:04.767]"and to show solidarity.
[00:21:06.877]"An unfriendly and hostile relationship
[00:21:09.127]"to our state may possibly be the key
[00:21:11.217]"to all of our current political shortcomings.
[00:21:14.707]"We Czechs have always functioned better
[00:21:16.887]"in some kind of community.
[00:21:19.127]"Yet we always behave like difficult children.
[00:21:22.687]"We were naughty in Vienna under Austria
[00:21:25.207]"and now we are naughty in Brussels
[00:21:27.187]"under the European Union.
[00:21:30.467]"Czechs and Slovaks have always had
[00:21:32.397]"many bad experiences with Germans.
[00:21:35.239]"Perhaps we also resisted the thought
[00:21:37.517]"of being attacked by our best friend, The Soviet Union.
[00:21:41.663]"The reformed communists had no intention
[00:21:44.367]"of comparing communism with Nazism,
[00:21:47.027]"but how could it be that they did not understand
[00:21:49.187]"how the Soviets had formed The Soviet Union by force,
[00:21:52.787]"how in the early 1940s The Soviet Union
[00:21:55.727]"had invaded Baltic countries,
[00:21:57.806]"how they now use the very same method
[00:22:00.597]"in the invasion of our country in 1968?
[00:22:04.027]"The Soviet Union had always found a fifth column
[00:22:06.917]"in a country which called for help.
[00:22:10.097]"The Warsaw Pact was invited by the conservative wing
[00:22:13.787]"of the communist party to stop the reforms
[00:22:16.087]"by invading my country."
[00:22:21.767]"Here I would like to pose and mention
[00:22:24.807]"that 20 years later,
[00:22:26.287]"I saw the so-called 'letter of invitation'.
[00:22:31.247]"It was brought to the Prague Council
[00:22:33.197]"and placed in the hands of Vaclav Havel
[00:22:35.527]"by clerk with a soft unhealthy face,
[00:22:38.397]"a clerk who was wearing a badly-fitting and crumpled suit.
[00:22:43.767]"The letter of invitation was typed
[00:22:45.817]"on yellow socialist paper, complete with typing errors.
[00:22:50.777]"I stared at it and then I realized
[00:22:53.237]"that this lousy piece of paper
[00:22:54.987]"had destroyed 20 years of my life.
[00:23:02.467]"And not only my own, but that of an entire generation.
[00:23:09.017]"I was also there when the Dubcek met
[00:23:11.497]"with Vaclav Havel in 1989 during the Velvet Revolution.
[00:23:17.187]"I must say that Dubcek disappointed me
[00:23:20.017]"for during those years,
[00:23:22.567]"when he was removed from political life,
[00:23:25.277]"he had no change at all.
[00:23:28.457]"He had remained ever the lead apparatchik,
[00:23:31.665]"devoted to The Soviet Union
[00:23:33.983]"and the reform communists who desired power.
[00:23:38.831]"To this day, I can't understand
[00:23:41.957]"how I could I have been so reckless
[00:23:44.807]"as to accept an invitation to join a delegation
[00:23:48.007]"to Israel in July 1968.
[00:23:51.702]"I left that summer for Israel
[00:23:54.037]"with a group of young journalists,
[00:23:56.937]"aspiring writers, and student activists.
[00:24:01.747]"We wanted to prod the anchorage of our government
[00:24:04.987]"for a new view of diplomatic relations of Israel
[00:24:08.977]"relationship that had been disrupted
[00:24:11.685]"during the Six-Day War a year before.
[00:24:16.797]"Because our government together with The Soviet Union
[00:24:20.377]"to decide of the Arabs.
[00:24:23.267]"We went to work in a kibbutz and learn
[00:24:25.737]"about communism in practice to tell the truth.
[00:24:29.922]"I didn't like it at all,
[00:24:32.537]"since I'm allergic to ideologies,
[00:24:35.137]"although I understood that in Israel,
[00:24:37.767]"one could not live without one.
[00:24:42.317]"I didn't like living in a collective
[00:24:44.617]"since I was too individualistic.
[00:24:47.097]"Back in Prague, I had left my sweet baby
[00:24:50.307]"in the care of my husband who was still a student.
[00:24:56.177]"On August 21st,
[00:24:59.658]"at 10 a.m. near Nazareth,
[00:25:02.987]"we learned from our Russian guide
[00:25:04.917]"that our country was being invaded
[00:25:07.417]"by the Warsaw Pact armies.
[00:25:10.407]"We skipped Nazareth and went straight to Jerusalem.
[00:25:14.827]"There we walked down the Via Dolorosa
[00:25:18.297]"and I was hitting my head against the railing wall.
[00:25:22.987]"It was as though Czechoslovakia had ceased to exist.
[00:25:27.277]"Since the invaders had disrupted our travel
[00:25:30.377]"and every other contact was impossible
[00:25:33.267]"since phone lines had also been disconnected.
[00:25:37.777]"We spent all night at the latest news agency
[00:25:41.597]"and wait for any news on the telex.
[00:25:45.087]"We learned of horrible events such as
[00:25:47.850]"that the Old Town Square was occupied by tanks
[00:25:50.957]"and that Soviet canons were aimed at the Prague Castle.
[00:25:56.697]"They were ready...
[00:26:04.640]"To shoot it to pieces
[00:26:08.727]"if the Czechoslovaks did not sign their (mumbles)
[00:26:13.417]"Soon we were sought out by journalists.
[00:26:18.037]"I was attractive for them
[00:26:20.787]"since I was the mother of a small child
[00:26:23.427]"and I also knew English reasonably well.
[00:26:27.286]"I began my struggle through the media
[00:26:30.797]"as I spoke against the invasion for television.
[00:26:34.267]"We took up public collection for the good of the cause.
[00:26:39.500]"A few of us even decided to form guerrilla unit
[00:26:43.777]"and we even went to see Moshe Dayan
[00:26:46.677]"to ask him for guns.
[00:26:48.777]"We really wished to fight The Soviet Union.
[00:26:55.427]"In departing for Israel,
[00:26:58.087]"I had caused pain to myself in two ways.
[00:27:02.337]"First, my little child was stayed behind in a country
[00:27:05.765]"that was now ceased to exist.
[00:27:09.857]"Second, I had to except the capitulation
[00:27:12.417]"of my country in far away Israel
[00:27:15.487]"which had won its war in defense
[00:27:17.837]"of its country one year earlier.
[00:27:24.076]"'Run, run!'
[00:27:26.259]"Jews who had survived the Holocaust were calling out to me
[00:27:31.507]"for the saw the invasion as a bad omen for the future.
[00:27:36.507]"They offered to let us stay in Israel and study Hebrew.
[00:27:42.097]"They offered us financial help as well.
[00:27:46.858]"We were surrounded by love and care.
[00:27:50.317]"They told me that I would be taken to a Siberian gulag
[00:27:53.927]"as soon as I crossed the border
[00:27:55.987]"and that I would be accused of zionism
[00:27:59.746]"and would be viewed as having being infected
[00:28:03.727]"with a hostile ideology.
[00:28:06.447]"They offered us warm clothing.
[00:28:09.696]"I decided that I had to at least return
[00:28:12.547]"to the proximity of my country somewhere
[00:28:15.627]"where I could find out what was happening.
[00:28:19.437]"I flew to Rome,
[00:28:23.097]"and there was no news there
[00:28:25.147]"since the borders were closed
[00:28:26.887]"and the telephone and mail were not functioning.
[00:28:30.057]"I moved to Vienna and there,
[00:28:32.227]"after standing in a line for three hours,
[00:28:35.697]"I was finally able to call home.
[00:28:38.427]"My omnipotent father ordered me to return immediately."
[00:29:14.890]Excuse me.
[00:29:17.357]"'Run away,' an old Jewish lady
[00:29:20.287]"with whom I stayed in Vienna told me in Vienna.
[00:29:23.937]"There were thousands of Czechs walking around
[00:29:26.857]"with pale faces and glistening eyes.
[00:29:30.448]"I found a bus with Czech license plates
[00:29:34.427]"by the St. Stephen's Cathedral
[00:29:37.157]"and I took one of the seats which had been left empty
[00:29:41.137]"after those who had chosen to run away
[00:29:44.447]"and had left the bus.
[00:29:47.607]"When I reached my home street
[00:29:49.387]"in Prague early in the morning,
[00:29:51.517]"I was stopped by Soviet soldiers.
[00:29:54.267]"They wanted to see my passport "and they said,"
[00:29:58.302](speaking foreign language)
[00:30:01.184]"'A young girl returning from her vacation.'
[00:30:06.467]"They had parked their tanks behind them
[00:30:11.717]"on the slope opposite our house
[00:30:13.667]"where machine guns posed."
[00:30:16.807]"The Czechoslovakian government
[00:30:18.277]"had began making compromises too soon,
[00:30:21.517]"which were accepted by citizens
[00:30:23.097]"who believed that the foreign armies would soon leave.
[00:30:25.932]"In September, new laws concerning censorship
[00:30:28.987]"and the abolition of freedom of assembly were approved.
[00:30:33.007]"The media explained the presence of the army
[00:30:35.572]"as a necessity in order to secure the safety
[00:30:38.877]"of all socialist countries
[00:30:40.347]"from West German revolutionist powers.
[00:30:45.377]"Eventually, what our comrades had signed
[00:30:48.037]"in Moscow became public knowledge.
[00:30:50.567]"At this point, the paths of the people
[00:30:52.647]"and the party leaders definitively diverged.
[00:30:55.897]"Magazines and newspapers
[00:30:57.417]"which defended the pre-August line ceased publication.
[00:31:00.984]"Conservatives started their own media,
[00:31:05.526]"as spontaneous fun for the republic
[00:31:07.867]"with 273 million crowns and 80 kilos of gold
[00:31:11.922]"was absorbed by the State Treasury.
[00:31:15.877]"For a few hours, Dubcek was trying
[00:31:17.937]"to satisfy the requirements of Moscow
[00:31:20.217]"and simultaneously the complaints of citizens.
[00:31:24.217]"The communist party leadership was explaining
[00:31:26.477]"that peace could only be preserved
[00:31:28.167]"if citizens would only be quiet
[00:31:30.107]"and not take to the streets.
[00:31:32.087]"They explained that strikes and any other kinds
[00:31:34.617]"of protest would ruin all reform efforts.
[00:31:37.817]"On January 16th 1969, a student of history,
[00:31:41.307]"Jan Palach burned himself to death
[00:31:43.247]"in protest against government policy.
[00:31:46.187]"Students embarked upon a sit-down strike
[00:31:48.677]"and police dispersed the street demonstrations.
[00:31:52.007]"The greatest wave of immigration
[00:31:53.717]"in the 20th century removed thousands
[00:31:55.897]"of talented and educated citizens.
[00:31:58.504]"An exemplary totalitarian leader, Dr. Gustav Husak,
[00:32:04.005]"appeared to take power in his own hands
[00:32:06.727]"to promote normalization,
[00:32:08.607]"the process by which the communist party's power
[00:32:11.057]"would be reinstated.
[00:32:13.007]"He became the first Secretary of the Central Committee
[00:32:17.187]"of Czechoslovak Communist Party,
[00:32:19.301]"then the president as well.
[00:32:21.952]"The greatest opponents of the reform movement were rewarded
[00:32:26.297]"with high government positions.
[00:32:28.457]"Purges took place, citizens had to sign
[00:32:30.947]"that they were in agreement with the occupation
[00:32:34.006]"or else they would be fired.
[00:32:35.997]"The first political shot trials began."
[00:32:42.187]"Allow me to return to my own story now.
[00:32:44.907]"I wrote an article for Listy magazine
[00:32:48.427]"about Jan Zajíc, a second student
[00:32:50.696]"who on February 25th 1969, had burned himself to death
[00:32:56.737]"on the day of commemoration
[00:32:58.527]"for the communist coup d'etat of 1945.
[00:33:04.781]"Jan Palach, the first student to receive the state funeral,
[00:33:08.737]"but Jan Zajíc was buried quietly in a local cemetery
[00:33:13.237]"in the place where he was born,
[00:33:16.470]"Vítkov by Opava in northern Moravia.
[00:33:18.928]"Listy, the magazine where I worked as a reporter,
[00:33:22.647]"ceased publication shortly thereafter and...
[00:33:36.787]"Was branded as the the most
[00:33:39.255]"counterrevolutionary magazine in the country.
[00:33:42.998]"The names of all Listy reporters,
[00:33:46.057]"the editors, were listed,
[00:33:48.527]"and those whose names were on the list were not allowed
[00:33:51.857]"to publish, including mine.
[00:33:55.647]"The promoters of normalization sealed the borders.
[00:33:59.197]"Unlike in the '50s, this violence was more civilized.
[00:34:04.027]"People lost their professional positions
[00:34:06.487]"and had to work as maneuverable laborers instead.
[00:34:10.877]"But there not condemned to death.
[00:34:13.677]"Officially, the regime promised a peaceful life
[00:34:16.567]"and peace in change for work.
[00:34:20.007]"No one notified...
[00:34:27.307]"Notified me of any publication ban,
[00:34:30.993]"so I had to learn about it later from my own experience.
[00:34:36.227]"Again, I have never understood
[00:34:38.277]"how people could give in so easily.
[00:34:43.315]"How could they allow themselves to be 'normalized',
[00:34:48.000]"to admit that what was once white
[00:34:51.956]"was now the color black and vice versa.
[00:34:57.360]"What was 'normal'?
[00:35:00.207]"People were afraid of each other.
[00:35:03.967]"The state police were doing fine.
[00:35:08.967]"But I must admit that I was in despair.
[00:35:13.167]"My husband was studying at the film college
[00:35:16.987]"and I promised him I would provide a livelihood
[00:35:23.087]"for our own family.
[00:35:25.680]"There was an old house in our village
[00:35:30.567]"where a mental hospital had been installed
[00:35:32.887]"in a former monastery.
[00:35:35.547]"It contained about 600 incurable patients,
[00:35:39.977]"it was an institution for chronic patients
[00:35:43.167]"who were either schizophrenic or bipolar.
[00:35:46.717]"I visited with the chief physician
[00:35:50.297]"and offered to come in as volunteer
[00:35:53.207]"and help out the nurses.
[00:35:56.337]"The chief physician welcomed the assistance.
[00:35:59.117]"Two nurses were in charge of about 70 patients
[00:36:02.847]"and they could barely manage to dress and feed them.
[00:36:06.727]"My task was to converse with the patients.
[00:36:14.822]"Only much later did I understand
[00:36:17.667]"that I was afraid of going mad myself
[00:36:20.157]"and therefore, I went straight to a mental institution.
[00:36:24.587]"As I spent more time with the patients,
[00:36:27.447]"I realized that the situation was not so bad
[00:36:30.237]"in comparison with their situation.
[00:36:33.289]"Paradoxically, I felt freer behind the bars
[00:36:37.097]"of the institution than outside.
[00:36:39.687]"It seemed to me that life was more normal inside
[00:36:43.206]"than outside under a normalization regime.
[00:36:48.188]"In the hospital, patients could say whatever they pleased
[00:36:53.367]"because they had already been declared insane.
[00:36:58.007]"To write articles and reports to hide away in a desk drawer
[00:37:01.957]"and wait for better times to publish made no sense.
[00:37:06.457]"And so, I began writing short stories
[00:37:09.327]"about people who had spent...
[00:37:20.357]"30 or 40 years inside a mental institution
[00:37:24.717]"and who therefore had never experienced real socialism
[00:37:28.417]"in the outside world.
[00:37:30.887]"Most of them were old and they had not been treated
[00:37:34.547]"with more than psychopharmaceutical drugs.
[00:37:38.347]"Hence they retained vivid association.
[00:37:42.097]"For me, it was like raw material...
[00:37:48.860]No, "For me, it was raw material for surrealistic poetry.
[00:37:55.027]"As a journalist, I was used to working with facts.
[00:37:58.529]"But these souls inspired me in an ability to tell stories.
[00:38:04.417]"They took me into their world of madness
[00:38:07.257]"which appeared more normal than the world
[00:38:09.537]"outside the bars of the institution.
[00:38:13.697]"They helped me in a fact much more
[00:38:16.087]"than I was able to help them.
[00:38:21.517]"The beginning of the 1970s was the hardest time
[00:38:25.167]"of my life so far.
[00:38:28.047]"Many friends had lost their professional jobs
[00:38:30.617]"because they refused to sign statements admitting
[00:38:33.857]"that they agreed with the invasion,
[00:38:36.647]"and with the fact that those armies had invaded
[00:38:40.797]"in order to liberate us from counterrevolution.
[00:38:45.697]"Spines were cracking and bending.
[00:38:48.007]"People were hanging their heads like dogs
[00:38:50.937]"and they didn't want to look into the eyes of other people.
[00:38:55.797]"We were fearful of one another
[00:38:58.707]"and the old fear from the days
[00:39:00.637]"of the Nazi protectorate
[00:39:04.297]"and the '50s sprang to life again.
[00:39:07.997]"Some people enclosed the street
[00:39:10.237]"to the other side to avoid somebody...
[00:39:15.677]"To avoid meeting with Vaclav Havel or Ludvik Vaculik.
[00:39:20.322]"The regime didn't use violence as it had in the '50s.
[00:39:24.467]"It was not so cruel,
[00:39:26.194]"and not so nervous about those
[00:39:28.376]"who were labeled enemies of socialism or hooligans,
[00:39:33.997]"for handing out leaflets to encourage people not to vote
[00:39:38.977]"since only one party was on the ballot.
[00:39:42.927]"Opponents of the regime were labeled Trotskyite,
[00:39:48.437]"or even worse, sentenced
[00:39:49.817]"just for singing banned songs in a pub.
[00:39:55.098]"Later, I was able to obtain a position
[00:39:58.827]"at the University Archive with some help.
[00:40:02.057]"I was organizing old magazines and papers,
[00:40:05.367]"but I could have had a much worse job.
[00:40:11.098]"I also had to classify letters
[00:40:13.407]"from political informers from the '50s.
[00:40:27.657]"The most primitive that I had ever seen,
[00:40:30.917]"letters from housekeepers and street informers
[00:40:34.407]"full of hatred, revenge, and spiteful dirt about others.
[00:40:42.447]"In one word, ghastly.
[00:40:47.517]"It was dark everywhere
[00:40:49.667]"and it seemed that it would be like that forever.
[00:40:53.127]"Back then, we knew the future generation would pay
[00:40:56.737]"for the actions of their parents
[00:40:58.547]"and grandparents during the communist era.
[00:41:03.217]"Society was overcome by fear and petitions,
[00:41:07.667]"and protests hopelessly disappeared
[00:41:09.697]"down the storm drain of history.
[00:41:14.532]"And as much as the Husak regime carried out normalization
[00:41:19.187]"in a ghastly intelligent manner,
[00:41:22.867]"no problem ever saw the light of day.
[00:41:25.577]"Trials were held in secret
[00:41:27.617]"and all information was kept hidden away."
[00:41:32.897]"In 1975, Vaclav Havel wrote an open letter addressed
[00:41:36.787]"to Dr. Gustav Husak.
[00:41:38.520]"Havel's friends considered
[00:41:40.311]"this a kamikaze suicidal mission.
[00:41:43.587]"The brilliant essayist Havel described
[00:41:46.287]"the current situation in precisely the right terms,
[00:41:49.547]"and we were all relieved, even though we feared
[00:41:52.297]"that he would be jailed immediately.
[00:41:54.481]"Havel, perhaps because he himself was afraid
[00:41:57.997]"of what would happen to him,
[00:41:59.557]"first analyzed fear as a systemic tool
[00:42:02.567]"for carrying out existential pressure
[00:42:05.097]"exercised by the state police.
[00:42:07.433]"Fear was something that not a single citizen could escape.
[00:42:11.817]"Amid deep economic and moral crises,
[00:42:14.547]"the system extended power to people without morals,
[00:42:17.817]"to opportunists who opened themselves to any humiliation
[00:42:21.767]"and who were prepared to even sacrifice
[00:42:23.977]"their own family members in order to please those in power.
[00:42:27.847]"In such a system, people become disinterested,
[00:42:30.947]"unconcerned, and detached.
[00:42:33.687]"And that was the main goal of state policy.
[00:42:36.390]"They preformed political rituals in order to secure peace
[00:42:39.937]"and enough time to eliminate chronic shortages of goods.
[00:42:43.777]"But peace and order came at a deadly cost for society.
[00:42:47.857]"Culture was castrated and made banal,
[00:42:50.412]"just right for simple shallow people.
[00:42:53.708]"According to Havel, somewhere at the base
[00:42:57.227]"of power is the principal of death.
[00:42:59.827]"He pushed the limits of what could be tolerated
[00:43:02.417]"and the authorities did not put him in jail immediately.
[00:43:05.667]"He and Ludvik Vaculik always stood on the edge
[00:43:09.225]"and with their every action,
[00:43:11.007]"they tried to enlarge a space for life
[00:43:13.047]"for all who were labeled as shaken
[00:43:15.337]"by philosopher Jan Patocka.
[00:43:18.504]"Many people delegated their responsibility to Vaclav Havel
[00:43:22.547]"and he relieved them from pricks of conscience.
[00:43:25.467]"The letter circulated in duplicate form
[00:43:28.737]"and people came to understand how the individual things
[00:43:31.697]"that worried them were all interconnected.
[00:43:34.477]"They realized the complexity
[00:43:36.057]"of the demonic master plan of normalization."
[00:43:41.927]"I had two small children.
[00:43:43.717]"During the day, I worked at the archives
[00:43:46.827]"and at night I kept on writing
[00:43:49.117]"to keep myself from going crazy.
[00:43:52.327]"I tried to submit my manuscript to publishers.
[00:43:55.657]"At first, the spoke to me and accepted my manuscript.
[00:44:00.692]"But when I called them again,
[00:44:02.952]"they refused to even speak with me
[00:44:05.457]"as though they could catch some terrible disease
[00:44:08.497]"from me over the phone.
[00:44:10.887]"Some publishers wrote to me
[00:44:13.437]"that the book was too existential,
[00:44:19.847]"too naturalistic, and that did not fit
[00:44:22.937]"with their publishing plans, et cetera.
[00:44:26.097]"I tried it with two books,
[00:44:27.857]"and always it was the same response.
[00:44:32.137]"When I had three manuscripts in the desk drawer,
[00:44:34.587]"Ludvik actually came to see me
[00:44:36.697]"and offered to publish them
[00:44:38.207]"in Padlock Press, Edice Petlice,
[00:44:42.097]"an underground press which he had founded.
[00:44:44.987]"The books emerged as carbon copy editions,"
[00:44:48.177](mumbles) "In 12 copies.
[00:44:50.657]"Back then I met with a typist, Zdena Erteltova-Phillipsova,
[00:44:54.847]"who copied and gave life to about 150 titles,
[00:45:00.267]"some of which were copied more than once.
[00:45:04.467]"She typed on a black console typewriter
[00:45:07.237]"and her fingernails black.
[00:45:11.297]"I began publishing in underground publishing houses.
[00:45:16.027]"Vaclav Havel ran Expedition Press,
[00:45:20.332]"Edice Expedice, which published foreign authors
[00:45:24.707]"in translation, also essays...
[00:45:38.677]"And his stories.
[00:45:41.287]"He took personal responsibility
[00:45:43.647]"and signed the copies himself.
[00:45:45.417]"Vladimir Pistorius started Krameriova Press,
[00:45:48.907]"Krameriova Expedice,
[00:45:50.727]"and published beautiful books which included illustrations
[00:45:54.117]"by forbidden authors.
[00:45:57.277]"As soon as my books appeared
[00:45:59.397]"in these underground publishing houses,
[00:46:01.347]"I became an enemy of the socialist state
[00:46:04.157]"and I had crossed the limits of legality.
[00:46:11.047]"I was called in for interrogation.
[00:46:13.757]"At first, they asked me to sign agreement to collaborate.
[00:46:18.167]"They informed me that I was young
[00:46:20.157]"and that it would be a shame for me not to cooperate.
[00:46:25.197]"If I would repent and admit
[00:46:30.197]"that I had been missiled by bad friends,
[00:46:33.257]"and if I signed, that I would be allowed
[00:46:35.697]"to publish official again.
[00:46:38.207]"When I refused to sign, they threatened me.
[00:46:42.067]"Little by little, they introduced me
[00:46:44.347]"to their sheet metal hell,
[00:46:46.167]"with all its bars, padlocks, bolts, and tall bars.
[00:46:52.182]"I was also reminded that my husband
[00:46:55.317]"and our children would suffer for my sake
[00:46:58.717]"on account of my guilty and imprudent behavior.
[00:47:03.057]"During the time, it hurt me a lot.
[00:47:05.812]"I was practicing yoga
[00:47:09.057]"since the breathing and mental exercises helped me
[00:47:12.097]"to overcome my fears.
[00:47:14.087]"The interrogators were used to dealing with fear.
[00:47:18.207]"But when there was no fear, it only made them nervous."
[00:47:24.047]"The Plastic People of the Universe was a young band
[00:47:26.547]"that played rock 'n' roll music.
[00:47:28.627]"Communist officials were outraged by their music
[00:47:31.317]"and by the fact that their musicians had long hair
[00:47:33.847]"and used vulgar language.
[00:47:36.057]"They took away their artistic license to perform in Prague
[00:47:39.097]"and later elsewhere in the country.
[00:47:41.527]"The Plastic People performed in the countryside
[00:47:43.967]"at various weddings and baptismal ceremonies
[00:47:46.657]"and young people kept coming to their concerts
[00:47:48.847]"from great distances.
[00:47:50.668]"The police kept guard at railway stations and bus stops
[00:47:54.517]"where they rounded up young people
[00:47:56.057]"and loaded them onto police trucks.
[00:47:58.417]"Several times they invaded the concerts
[00:48:00.477]"and beat up the audience.
[00:48:02.477]"The communist regime was in conflict with young people
[00:48:05.617]"and refused to allow them to live
[00:48:07.437]"as they wished and needed to live.
[00:48:10.207]"In its arrogance, the party assumed
[00:48:12.109]"the right to decide what people should like.
[00:48:15.937]"They arrested 19 musicians and their fans,
[00:48:19.018]"then initiated criminal charges against them.
[00:48:23.797]"There was a trial in which the human desire
[00:48:25.877]"for freedom was sentenced,
[00:48:27.617]"and the musicians were found guilty
[00:48:29.277]"of playing music which they liked.
[00:48:31.697]"The audience who gathered in the courtroom
[00:48:33.847]"formed the first organized protest.
[00:48:36.847]"There were reformed communists,
[00:48:38.437]"non party members, young and old alike,
[00:48:41.926]"all with a shared understanding.
[00:48:44.937]"Other disputes, differences of opinions
[00:48:47.247]"and age gaps no longer mattered.
[00:48:49.457]"There were Marxists, Trotskyites,
[00:48:52.147]"intellectuals, workers, and Christians,
[00:48:54.427]"all of them united and pulling together
[00:48:56.367]"in a single direction.
[00:48:58.227]"The trial brought together dissident groups
[00:49:00.297]"and laid the foundation for Charter 77.
[00:49:03.637]"In the text of Charter 77 was written by a team,
[00:49:07.087]"the leading voices of which were Jan Patocka
[00:49:10.057]"and Vaclav Havel.
[00:49:12.417]"Charter 77 addressed the Czechoslovakian government.
[00:49:16.467]"The signatories asked the government
[00:49:18.207]"to comply with the Helsinki protocol which it had signed
[00:49:21.837]"and to respect human rights.
[00:49:24.467]"The authors and couriers were arrested and interrogated
[00:49:28.347]"but their friends managed in the end to get 242 signatures
[00:49:32.737]"by the fifth of January, 1977.
[00:49:36.547]"The communist government and its representative ministry,
[00:49:39.347]"the home office, began to wage war
[00:49:41.797]"against these 242 signatories,
[00:49:44.917]"as if they were conspiring to bring down the regime.
[00:49:48.447]"The communist government represented socialism
[00:49:51.057]"and anyone who opposed them should be persecuted
[00:49:53.827]"and punished.
[00:49:55.357]"The government picked up the signatories
[00:49:57.167]"at home and at work
[00:49:58.357]"and then brought them in for interrogation.
[00:50:00.607]"They shouted at them, threatened them,
[00:50:02.387]"and caused them to lose their jobs.
[00:50:04.722]"They took away their passports, their driver's license,
[00:50:07.837]"telephones, and even their hunting and fishing licenses.
[00:50:11.427]"The spokesmen for Charter 77 were interrogated everyday
[00:50:15.207]"for many hours.
[00:50:16.793]"The media campaign against them was truly dreadful.
[00:50:20.786]"Back in the 1950s, it would have meant death.
[00:50:24.332]"When Havel was jailed,
[00:50:26.069]"the other two spokesmen worked even harder.
[00:50:30.177]"Intimidation only had the opposite effect.
[00:50:33.147]"Indeed, it was said that what had been concealed
[00:50:36.097]"and forbidden for years was liberating.
[00:50:39.347]"The communists quickly organized a counteraction.
[00:50:42.567]"In the national theater,
[00:50:43.687]"the sanctuary of Czech culture,
[00:50:45.807]"they had the cultural elites sign a so-called anti-charter
[00:50:49.517]"in which artists expressed their disagreement
[00:50:52.137]"and condemned Charter 77."
[00:50:59.174]I participated in the funeral
[00:51:01.517]"of the first spokesmen of Charter 77,
[00:51:05.267]"my beloved professor of philosophy, Jan Patocka,
[00:51:08.637]"who was killed by the secret police
[00:51:10.737]"in the course of lengthy interrogation.
[00:51:14.597]"During the funeral, helicopters circled above the cemetery
[00:51:18.317]"and behind the cemetery were motorcyclists.
[00:51:22.547]"Secret policemen were assigned sitting
[00:51:25.157]"on the gravestones and filming us.
[00:51:28.457]"Then and there, I promised myself
[00:51:32.047]"not to have anything to do with such a regime.
[00:51:35.047]"Since I was unemployed at the time,
[00:51:37.477]"I was in no danger of losing my job.
[00:51:41.777]"I soon made friends with the writers,
[00:51:44.917]"artists, historians, philosophers, and other intellectuals
[00:51:48.387]"who had been part of the dissident movement.
[00:51:51.787]"I began attending so-called quarter meetings,
[00:51:55.127]"organized by Ludvik Vaculik.
[00:51:57.617]"Four times a year we would meet for a weekend
[00:52:01.837]"at some secret location in bohemian Moravia, Slovakia.
[00:52:06.927]"Each month we 'published' a magazine,
[00:52:12.847]"entitled, Obsah, Content, A Literary Review.
[00:52:16.317]"Each member of our (speaks foreign word)
[00:52:18.617]"as Vaculik nicknamed the founding members,
[00:52:22.647]"had to submit an essay, a short story, or a poem
[00:52:27.417]"typed in 14 copies, later in 28 copies.
[00:52:31.077]"That condition made it difficult for me.
[00:52:40.484]"Often I would finish my story on page six,
[00:52:43.277]"since I didn't wish to retype it again.
[00:52:46.147]"Carbon copies were crumbled or else,
[00:52:48.827]"I put them into the typewriter the wrong side up
[00:52:55.307]"and therefore, the text was copied
[00:52:57.667]"on the back of the type page.
[00:53:00.737]"Despite that, I always fulfilled my promise
[00:53:03.527]"and I was no longer fearful
[00:53:09.295]"that I would lose my mind.
[00:53:10.927]"My books were coming out
[00:53:14.517]"in other underground editions
[00:53:16.327]"such as Krameriova of Vladimir Pistorius
[00:53:19.057]"or Expedition Press of Vaclav Havel and others.
[00:53:22.985]"We were then approached by the Swiss publisher,
[00:53:26.827]"Jurgen Braunschweiger, by Fischer,
[00:53:28.727]"a German publishing house from Frankfurt am Main,
[00:53:32.087]"and by (mumbles) publishers from Cologne.
[00:53:35.977]"They published my books in German
[00:53:38.017]"thanks to my great translator, Hank Geerts,
[00:53:40.777]"my books started coming out in Dutch.
[00:53:48.405]"Czech publishers, such as 68 Publishers
[00:53:52.154]"of Josef Skvorecky and Zdena Salivarova
[00:53:56.487]"are indexed in Cologne, Germany and," (mumbles)
[00:53:59.497]"in London began to publish my books in Czech.
[00:54:03.387]"Seeing my books in my native Czech language
[00:54:06.138]"brought me great joy.
[00:54:08.477]"Somehow, it felt more fulfilling
[00:54:11.837]"than to Czech them in carbon copies.
[00:54:14.956]"Manuscripts and books, even those that were non political,
[00:54:19.417]"were smuggled into Czechoslovakia via diplomatic channels.
[00:54:24.277]"Even children's books were smuggled
[00:54:28.693]"and German culture and press attache were given
[00:54:31.717]"direct orders from the German Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
[00:54:37.858]"The Swedes were also quite helpful.
[00:54:40.867]"I'm mentioning by name at least those
[00:54:43.347]"whom I was in touch with personally.
[00:54:47.647]"I became close friends with Vaclav Havel
[00:54:50.567]"when he was released from his long prison sentence in 1984.
[00:54:56.907]"During that time in the '80s,
[00:55:01.057]"it was as though we were waiting together this order
[00:55:05.047]"of the other Soviets satellites
[00:55:07.179]"until the international situation was right for change.
[00:55:12.787]"The Soviet Union was armored to the T's
[00:55:15.457]"while the economies all over
[00:55:18.387]"the Soviet block were collapsing.
[00:55:20.807]"It was like robbing people to people.
[00:55:26.917]"I make my living by writing German tourist guides...
[00:55:40.005]"Of Prague, under the pen name of Albert Norman.
[00:55:45.567]"I got this job thanks to friend,
[00:55:47.777]"a great writer named Jiri Grusa
[00:55:49.957]"who was living in Exile.
[00:55:52.077]"Guide books were always being updated and reprinted
[00:55:55.657]"and I was working on them with my German translator
[00:55:58.637]"and helper three months each year.
[00:56:01.747]"In the remaining time, I could write my own books.
[00:56:09.577]"For many years, I was unable to travel to the west.
[00:56:13.437]"But in 1988...
[00:56:28.039]"A new law was passed
[00:56:29.505]"when the state needed to improve," (mumbles)
[00:56:32.557]"in a time of economic hardship.
[00:56:35.517]"Friends, relatives, and institutions were allowed
[00:56:40.220]"to buy out Czech citizen to travel
[00:56:43.657]"if he or she were fortunate enough
[00:56:46.237]"to receive an invitation.
[00:56:48.947]"This enabled me to leave the country.
[00:56:51.947]"I left on the first available flight
[00:56:54.767]"before the Ministry of Foreign Affairs
[00:56:56.827]"could change its mind.
[00:56:59.957]"At Dulles Airport in Washington DC,
[00:57:03.207]"I was welcomed with American flags
[00:57:05.317]"by delegation From George Washington University.
[00:57:09.177]"For the first time in my life,
[00:57:10.937]"I was publicly recognized as a writer.
[00:57:14.737]"Later, when I was invited to Harvard University Library
[00:57:18.307]"to read one of my short stories,
[00:57:20.657]"I experienced another unforgettable moment.
[00:57:26.497]"For the first time in my life, I had seen computers
[00:57:35.147]"and my guide encouraged me to type
[00:57:37.857]"in the subject, Czech Underground Literature.
[00:57:42.517]"I did as I was told and the computer accepted it.
[00:57:47.207]"Then she encouraged me to insert my name.
[00:57:50.907]"I trembled a bit, but complied.
[00:57:55.157]"On the screen, there appeared eight titles under my name,
[00:57:59.177]"listed as, Carbon Copies Signed by the Author.
[00:58:03.737]"I began to cry, feeling a bit like Robinson Crusoe,
[00:58:08.747]"who long ago threw a bottle into the ocean
[00:58:11.727]"and somehow, the message inside arrived
[00:58:15.024]"at its intended destination.
[00:58:18.197]"Something similar happened to me
[00:58:20.269]"in the Special Collection Library
[00:58:22.777]"of the University of Toronto in Canada.
[00:58:26.889]"But there, they stared at...
[00:58:36.977]"They stared at me as though I were the phantom
[00:58:40.227]"and asked me to sign their samizdat copies of my writings.
[00:58:45.814]"Another unforgettable moment occurred
[00:58:48.357]"at the reception of the American PEN Club in New York City
[00:58:52.297]"where Arthur Miller, Susan Sontag,
[00:58:54.977]"and Kurt Vonnegut attended my reading.
[00:58:58.727]"I appreciated their presence as an expression of solidarity
[00:59:02.227]"with Czechoslovakian dissidence."
[00:59:07.057]"In January of 1989 in New York City,
[00:59:09.797]"I was involved in a local commemorative week
[00:59:12.127]"for Jan Palach's self-immolation
[00:59:14.177]"in Prague 20 years earlier.
[00:59:16.457]"I made many phone calls to Prague
[00:59:18.977]"from payphones on the streets
[00:59:20.607]"and I was amazed at the energy and vitality
[00:59:23.437]"of the commemoration back home
[00:59:25.077]"of this student's act of protest,
[00:59:27.457]"something which had been hushed up 20 year earlier.
[00:59:30.857]"Vaclav Havel was jailed again, then released,
[00:59:33.697]"and he initiated a petition called, A Few Sentences,
[00:59:38.167]"and the names of these signatories were broadcasted
[00:59:40.907]"by radio for Europe.
[00:59:42.787]"Protest and repression intensified all year up to November.
[00:59:46.841]"The Berlin Wall had come down
[00:59:49.057]"but in Prague, nothing was happening.
[00:59:51.287]"My daughters went to demonstrations
[00:59:53.267]"where the police beat them up and detained them.
[00:59:55.837]"On November 17th, I went to a demonstration myself.
[00:59:59.847]"I was angry that these demonstrations
[01:00:01.827]"were always the same number of people in the crowds, 5000,
[01:00:06.517]"and that the demonstrators were still openly beaten
[01:00:09.447]"and persecuted by the police.
[01:00:11.774]"Just to stay at home and wait for my children
[01:00:14.867]"to return was too much for me.
[01:00:17.447]"I found myself face-to-face
[01:00:19.017]"with the armored special forces."
[01:00:22.727]"Then everything picked up speed.
[01:00:25.776]"Vaclav Havel founded the Civic Forum,
[01:00:27.697]"Občanské fórum initiative.
[01:00:30.387]"I called him and expressed my readiness to help.
[01:00:35.797]"We met in his apartment half an hour later.
[01:00:40.367]"I volunteered to supervise communications
[01:00:43.417]"and to make certain that all Civic Forum proclamation
[01:00:47.577]"would not contain cliches which had been used
[01:00:51.877]"in the communist party press.
[01:00:54.557]"We all contributed what was needed.
[01:00:57.097]"When Vaclav Havel was selected President,
[01:00:59.517]"he asked some people from the coordination center
[01:01:02.817]"of Civic Forum to follow him in the castle
[01:01:08.247]"where the presidential office was located.
[01:01:10.987]"I was unable to refuse his request.
[01:01:14.487]"Though he was not that anxious to take office,
[01:01:18.197]"there was no one else who was suitable as he.
[01:01:22.067]"In a fact, he sacrificed himself.
[01:01:25.517]"We inherited the actual office
[01:01:28.347]"of the last communist president
[01:01:30.197]"and First Secretary of the Communist Party,
[01:01:32.757]"the same with Gustav Husak.
[01:01:34.987]"On December 29th, 1989,
[01:01:37.749]"he entered the Prague Castle premises
[01:01:41.952]"which was still guarded by the army
[01:01:44.417]"under the jurisdiction of the communist home office.
[01:01:49.657]"In the long corridors in the castle were soldiers
[01:01:52.737]"with machine guns beside each window.
[01:01:56.957]"There were only about 10 of us
[01:01:59.127]"and we had but six volunteers among us
[01:02:02.427]"who were skilled in the martial arts.
[01:02:07.527]"But that is a different story
[01:02:09.077]"and this conference is more
[01:02:10.547]"about the Prague Spring and normalization.
[01:02:13.747]"I would like to thank you for your attention."
[01:02:17.328](applause)
[01:02:53.318]Thank you very much.
[01:02:55.990]So, thank you, Eda and Racquel,
[01:02:58.600]this was very remarkable
[01:03:00.070]and what a start we are having here.
[01:03:02.490]You know, this was wonderful.
[01:03:03.630]So, let's have a QA session.
[01:03:05.166]I do believe that there are many of you
[01:03:07.550]who have some questions so please.
[01:03:21.890]Thanks, I have a question,
[01:03:23.720]you mentioned Petr Pithart and the book, Sixty-Eight,
[01:03:29.216]in which he analyzes the whole Prague Spring debacle
[01:03:33.300]from building to end and one of the things
[01:03:35.590]that he mentions in this book is how journalists
[01:03:42.183]who were used to dealing with censors
[01:03:43.500]before they published their work
[01:03:45.342]were then confronted with the freedom
[01:03:49.460]not to have the censorship,
[01:03:50.950]and they found the new freedom sometimes,
[01:03:55.025]at least at the beginning, confusing.
[01:03:57.540]And I was wondering, you have the experience
[01:03:59.700]of being a journalist before the Prague Spring
[01:04:02.580]and during the Prague Spring,
[01:04:05.320]is Pithart right when he says
[01:04:07.690]that the journalists were unprepared
[01:04:10.316]for the freedom that they got?
[01:04:20.810]It's difficult to say.
[01:04:22.150]I think there was a stream of good will
[01:04:29.175]to do as much as possible to reveal this 40 years
[01:04:35.310]of totalitarian system, and that...
[01:04:41.147]It was just spontaneous,
[01:04:43.160]and somehow the censorship faded during the Prague Spring.
[01:04:48.810]But I was not so well experienced
[01:04:52.270]because I was on the mother vacation. (chuckles)
[01:04:59.291]Maternal leave, yes.
[01:05:00.310]After all, it was until...
[01:05:06.760]'69 when Husak came to power,
[01:05:10.763]everything was just stopped like...
[01:05:15.720]Is it the answer to your question or not?
[01:05:20.494]Maybe I misunderstood.
[01:05:22.980]I was only trying to determine
[01:05:25.630]whether or not Pithart was accurate
[01:05:27.780]about the confusion that he felt.
[01:05:29.700]He tells a story, I think,
[01:05:31.160]about how when in January, there was a general, Sejna,
[01:05:38.718]who was plotting to organize some kind of coup
[01:05:42.690]to bring Novotny back or to support Novotny
[01:05:45.370]and the coup was exposed and he escaped to the west.
[01:05:50.417]Yes.
[01:05:51.250]And the communists went to,
[01:05:52.740]or rather, someone from the Central Committee went
[01:05:55.450]to Rude pravo and said, "Would you please write about this?"
[01:05:58.310]And they had no idea how to write about something
[01:06:01.360]that they had never been allowed to write about before.
[01:06:03.380]So, there was this kind of confusion that happened after
[01:06:06.451]when censorship was loosened up even
[01:06:09.870]in January of that year.
[01:06:12.425]I was wondering if that--
[01:06:13.910]I don't remember it very well,
[01:06:16.200]how was it with General Sejna, I'm sorry.
[01:06:19.467]But of course it was--
[01:06:22.120]You can, if you understand--
[01:06:27.410]The story is very murky to this day
[01:06:32.310]and there's been a lot written about it
[01:06:34.360]and it's still not unclear whether General Sejna was
[01:06:38.430]in the process of preparing a coup
[01:06:40.880]or whether he was a black marketeer
[01:06:45.843]who was caught with his hands in the tail
[01:06:47.798]and made his escape as a...
[01:06:55.782]As a newborn reformist or, so...
[01:07:00.010]I mean, but the truth is Eda,
[01:07:03.365]and I think that's the gist of Paul's question is
[01:07:07.610]that there were excellent journalists,
[01:07:11.530]and you and I remember them as commentators,
[01:07:17.080]as essay writers, but there were no reporters.
[01:07:21.210]I mean, there were, you know,
[01:07:23.200]what we call investigative journalism today
[01:07:28.565]was almost unheard of
[01:07:30.600]and they were, we were all learning on the job,
[01:07:37.314]and it was similar in 1989.
[01:07:41.220]Also, I remember better the series of articles
[01:07:47.540]on the desk of Jan Masaryk.
[01:07:51.700]I think that was all...
[01:07:55.590]Maybe done more
[01:07:57.910]than it was asked for.
[01:08:01.087](speaks foreign language)
[01:08:04.229]It's not yet clear if Jan Masaryk was murdered by KGB
[01:08:10.170]or jumped out of the window in the Czernin palac.
[01:08:15.750]So then started this big topic started
[01:08:19.342]in Prague Spring but they're not finished of course,
[01:08:24.680]or cleared up.
[01:08:27.262]Do we have another question?
[01:08:31.010]Yeah, you mentioned your feelings about Dubcek,
[01:08:35.580]and I know that if you would comment a little bit
[01:08:38.890]about what the relationship was between Havel and Dubcek
[01:08:42.960]at the time when Dubcek had his fatal accident,
[01:08:49.175]or even slightly before, because I think
[01:08:51.413]there's been kind of a general feeling among some people
[01:08:54.810]that had an impact on everything that was happening at time,
[01:08:59.520]I'm talking about later when Dubcek had his accident.
[01:09:02.260]So, not in 1968 but later on.
[01:09:08.700]Well, I can't say anything on Dubcek's accident.
[01:09:13.410]I mean, it's...
[01:09:16.240]It's out of my horizon, I would say.
[01:09:23.810]I don't know.
[01:09:28.571]And the relationship between Havel and Dubcek was not,
[01:09:35.160]they were not friends, they were so different that...
[01:09:41.940]Well, I don't know really, excuse me.
[01:09:47.614]Do you know?
[01:09:50.598]You are very helpful.
[01:09:52.358]No, no, no, I don't want to monopolize this
[01:09:56.447]but there is a very amusing incident
[01:10:00.270]from the Prague Spring in 1968,
[01:10:03.210]which Havel describes in I think
[01:10:07.607]in Disturbing the Peace or one of the other books
[01:10:10.570]when he was invited with a group of reformist writers
[01:10:16.830]to meet with Dubcek and the other leaders
[01:10:22.740]which Sejna was there, I think, and others.
[01:10:27.200]And the way Havel reported, he was so nervous
[01:10:30.170]that he had about three glasses of brandy before he went
[01:10:34.410]to speak to Dubcek and when he did,
[01:10:39.181]he behaved terribly, he gave him all kinds of advice
[01:10:43.990]and he didn't listen to what Dubcek had to say,
[01:10:47.876]and he describes it in this self-deprecating way
[01:10:51.835]that Havel wrote about himself, it's a sweet story.
[01:10:56.510]But that was the extent and he's very explicit on that,
[01:11:00.800]that was the extent of Havel's dealings with Dubcek in 1968.
[01:11:06.690]Okay, thank you, Michael.
[01:11:08.854]I can add a little bit to that as well
[01:11:10.010]because Josef Smrkovsky wrote a book
[01:11:12.000]about 1968 called, Mirakl, or the Miracle Game.
[01:11:15.290]And in that, a lot of the characters are,
[01:11:19.530]it's a Roman à clef, so a lot of the characters are real
[01:11:22.120]but they have fictional names.
[01:11:24.690]And there's a scene in the novel
[01:11:26.760]when a world famous playwright whose name is Hale
[01:11:30.970]in Skvorecky's book, has this sort
[01:11:33.210]of drunken conversation with Dubcek.
[01:11:36.230]And he tells Dubcek, "Don't worry,
[01:11:38.667]"everybody is for socialism,
[01:11:40.107]"we're not trying to bring capitalism back."
[01:11:42.790]And he said, "I'm a millionaire's son,
[01:11:49.297]"I don't want to be rich again, I've lived that life."
[01:11:53.084]And when I read this, when I translated it,
[01:11:57.760]I couldn't imagine Havel saying those things to Dubcek.
[01:12:01.570]I can't imagine him ever saying,
[01:12:03.398]"Don't worry, we're not trying to bring capitalism back,
[01:12:06.817]"we're all for socialism," 'cause it doesn't sound like him.
[01:12:09.260]But it's a novel, so.
[01:12:11.471]Thank you.
[01:12:13.690]I have another question.
[01:12:15.549]Of course, I left Czechoslovakia in 1968,
[01:12:19.790]a few days after the tanks rode in,
[01:12:23.270]and so, I wasn't there.
[01:12:27.172]But I was really observing and buying
[01:12:30.980]and reading assiduously.
[01:12:32.510]In fact, we were reading all the books
[01:12:34.890]that were published by 68 Publishers,
[01:12:37.771](speaks foreign language)
[01:12:39.820]And I was always thinking, then somebody told me,
[01:12:44.120]that about 25% of the publications of the output
[01:12:49.940]of those publishing houses went back to Czechoslovakia.
[01:12:55.890]If it is true, what was the impact of those publications
[01:13:02.317]that either were published, all the books
[01:13:04.590]that were published in the west,
[01:13:07.120]and/or that made it across the border,
[01:13:10.120]and how was it distributed among the people,
[01:13:13.860]if you can command upon that?
[01:13:20.571]I mentioned it already when I told that
[01:13:24.990]they were diplomat ways, I mean--
[01:13:29.680]Swedish--
[01:13:30.870]Swedish also, but I hadn't much contact with Swedish,
[01:13:35.830]my main contact was with (mumbles name)
[01:13:40.540]who was a German culture and press attache,
[01:13:45.853]and through whom we were sending our manuscripts
[01:13:51.610]via letters, even money back to Schenefeld
[01:13:59.100]to the documentation center of a Czech literature in exile.
[01:14:04.890]It was in Schwarzenberg Castle in Schenefeld in Germany
[01:14:11.560]where (mumbles name) was the director of it
[01:14:16.300]and it was all going through diplomatic ways
[01:14:23.569]to the center of independent Czech literature.
[01:14:31.120]The Americans, as far as I know,
[01:14:33.600]were not so not active because they were very much watched.
[01:14:38.780]But what was the (softly talks off mic)
[01:14:41.621]And the spread, yes.
[01:14:42.670]For the Czech and Soviet scene?
[01:14:45.360]Well, there was just these people
[01:14:48.800]who were living in so-called ghetto,
[01:14:53.918]spreading the books and the money and also different texts.
[01:15:01.361]So, they were very well known among the dissidents
[01:15:04.340]and then it was circulating,
[01:15:09.660]like a little by little (speaks foreign word)
[01:15:12.910]underground publishing house.
[01:15:15.240]There was rewriting, re-writed and re-writed,
[01:15:20.872]there was just, that circulate the samizdat
[01:15:24.340]and the people who wanted, who were interested,
[01:15:27.620]they were making more and more copies
[01:15:30.570]and nobody knew how many copies are circulating.
[01:15:36.770]In fact, the trick was that it was the first edition,
[01:15:42.210]like 14 copies, or because this is all you can put
[01:15:47.510]in one advance in the typewriter,
[01:15:51.207]they were signed by author.
[01:15:53.770]So, there was like his own activity.
[01:15:59.009]But of course nobody knew how many copies were,
[01:16:03.816]because according to the law,
[01:16:06.280]it should be they could find out,
[01:16:08.770]I don't remember now, I think 30 copies,
[01:16:13.290]then it would begin to be illegal
[01:16:17.360]and the author could be punished.
[01:16:23.029]So, I remember that one lady
[01:16:26.820]who was making copies was sentenced,
[01:16:33.170]a couple of pen writers signed a petition in her favor
[01:16:40.390]because we were arguing
[01:16:44.593]that she has not written the text,
[01:16:47.120]she only made copy.
[01:16:52.194]So, it was more dangerous for,
[01:16:53.560]sometimes it was dangerous for the ladies and men
[01:16:59.125]who were writing samizdats,
[01:17:02.870]re-writing samizdats.
[01:17:10.370]So, you could find out somewhere,
[01:17:12.300]somebody who had your book in some remote village,
[01:17:16.760]who had manuscript, in fact.
[01:17:21.540]Nobody knew the ways and nobody wanted
[01:17:24.080]to know it, of course.
[01:17:29.150]Alright, so do we have a question still?
[01:17:30.880]I think maybe she'll be just like one of the last ones.
[01:17:35.200]Okay.
[01:17:38.030]The other thing that I wanted to ask you
[01:17:39.940]or anybody else who has knowledge of it is that
[01:17:43.450]dealing with how surprised were you
[01:17:45.920]when The Soviet Union and the Warsaw Pact forces invaded,
[01:17:50.590]I mean, had there been discussions that,
[01:17:53.597]"Hey, this movement might be going too far,
[01:17:56.207]"we might be inviting some radical action
[01:17:59.767]"on the part of The Soviet Union,"
[01:18:04.310]did you ever think that it might happen beforehand?
[01:18:13.420]I don't know, maybe I misunderstood
[01:18:16.067](softly talks off mic) Microphone.
[01:18:17.391]Yeah.
[01:18:18.444](woman softly talking off mic)
[01:18:32.180](woman speaking foreign language)
[01:18:38.465]With the movement itself.
[01:18:40.326](woman speaking foreign language)
[01:18:43.070]I was talking about it already,
[01:18:45.970]that I think people believed our representatives
[01:18:51.610]and they were lying.
[01:18:53.320]They were saying that there's no danger,
[01:18:55.790]that they will not come,
[01:18:58.550]and they knew that they are going to come
[01:19:00.750]because they had their dealings.
[01:19:04.520]This is what I'm blamed of reformed communists,
[01:19:08.310]that they wanted to be popular,
[01:19:10.540]they wanted to be nice for the people
[01:19:12.450]and they wanted to be beloved
[01:19:14.850]because they were, for the first time in their life,
[01:19:17.720]that they felt like human solidarity
[01:19:22.682]on even a human face to them,
[01:19:27.667]and so, they didn't say the truth.
[01:19:30.410]I mean so, I think that I'm really blaming them
[01:19:35.210]and I'm blaming Dubcek because he was a liar,
[01:19:38.440]and then he came back, he signed the protocol in Moscow,
[01:19:44.090]humiliated protocol, and he came back and he wept when he...
[01:19:50.776]So, what kind of politician is it?
[01:19:54.110]Thank you.
[01:19:54.943]It's for me, it's my opinion.
[01:19:57.543]Other people might see differently.
[01:20:01.051]Thank you.
[01:20:02.914]Thank you, so let's have a last question
[01:20:05.393]because of the, I guess people are hungry.
[01:20:07.867](softly mumbles)
[01:20:10.999]Just a small comment on samizdat.
[01:20:13.930]I got two samizdat books and was intended
[01:20:18.780]to take them back to the Canadian Embassy
[01:20:22.930]because I had to leave the country then,
[01:20:25.340]and I thought, how am I going to manage that?
[01:20:30.976]And as I drove along the (speaking foreign language)
[01:20:34.490]there was a man walking along the side
[01:20:36.990]and I thought he could help me, it was Pavel Landovsky,
[01:20:39.870]and I stopped the car, and I said,
[01:20:43.702](speaking foreign language)
[01:20:46.609](laughing) and he said,
[01:20:48.450](speaking foreign language)
[01:20:50.499]and he saw immediately what was going on.
[01:20:52.460]I was not afraid, I was afraid in one way
[01:20:55.830]that they wouldn't let me in again the following year
[01:20:58.580]because I went every year.
[01:21:00.157]And so, we drove, he said I should go to the Deminka,
[01:21:05.710]I didn't know where the Deminka was,
[01:21:07.640]and he thought I was a little bit out of it,
[01:21:09.592]which maybe was true.
[01:21:11.550]And so, we went to the Deminka
[01:21:13.350]and I took a couple of Czech newspapers,
[01:21:16.305]and put the two books, which by chance,
[01:21:20.870]one of them was yours,
[01:21:24.690]and I passed them to Landovsky
[01:21:26.970]who took them and talked about the weather
[01:21:29.160]and left the Deminka,
[01:21:30.670]and I went relieved, I'm sorry to say,
[01:21:35.499]from these wonderful books
[01:21:38.200]because I could leave the country again
[01:21:42.210]and say, "I haven't got nothing."
[01:21:46.406]So, that's all just my small footnote on the topic.
[01:21:55.200]What a lovely last comment.
[01:21:56.690]So, thank you, everybody for attending this session
[01:21:58.940]and there are two concerts this afternoon
[01:22:00.940]and then the talks are on tomorrow again.
[01:22:02.990]So, enjoy the rest of the conference
[01:22:05.510]and you know, we have to speak these speakers.
[01:22:08.564](applause)

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Eda Kriseová speaks at Prague Spring 50

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