Following the outbreak of the war in Bosnia and Herzegovina Adin Ljuca was injured in the defence of Maglaj. He has lived in Prague since 1992 and has been a librarian at the Slavic Library for many years. He has published the poetry collection Hegira and Stalactite and the short story collection Tattooed Pictures.

His book One White Day has been translated by leading Balkan Studies expert František Šístek. He will lead a discussion with the author on images and stereotypes of the Balkans, Czech-South Slav relations, nationalism, the refugee phenomenon and literary matters. 

Second Hand Time is a completely extraordinary book by an exceptional writer who has received the most prestigious Russian, European and American literary awards. Following hopeful beginnings, the end of the Communist regime and the subsequent breakup of the Soviet empire left citizens disappointed, frustrated and disorientated. The text is a mosaic of dozens of genuine voices that Svetlana Alexievich recorded on a Dictaphone during interviews with a wide range of people and turned into literature. Her interviewees testify about how they believed in the Soviet system, how they killed and died for its ideals, about the secrets and horrors of communism, about the Stalinist Gulag, war, Chernobyl... They also offer a deep probe into Russian society and help us understand its current developments. In addition, they force readers to ponder what Russia is and why it is incapable of faster modernisation. Why the popularity of the autocrat Putin is around 85 percent and why 70 percent of Russians regard Stalin as a great man. It is a book about why Great Russia chauvinism is not just still alive but, heaven help us, ever more militant.

Helena Dvořáková, Hana Kofránková and Apolena Veldová will read from the book

The moderator will be Aleš Vrzák, director of the audio book, and translator Libor Dvořák. Vladimír Pistorius, who published it in book form, will appear as a guest.

Organised by the the Václav Havel Library in cooperation with publishers Radioservis

Pavel Tigrid (1917–2003) returned to his past with characteristic temperance when shortly after the war he wrote the now forgotten article Volá Londýn (London Calling). In it he captured the experience of wartime London, the BBC and the Czechoslovak exile community. The text is supplemented by a hitherto unreleased Tigrid programme for the BBC’s wartime broadcasts as well as a study exploring the context of Tigrid’s wartime exile and the fates of his friends and companions. The book Volá Londýn. Ze zákulisí československého vysílání z Londýna (London Calling: Behind the Scenes of Czechoslovak Broadcasting from London) is being published on the centenary of Tigrid’s birth by the Institute for the Study of Totalitarian Regimes.

Prokop Tomek (Military History Institute, Prague), Petr Orság (head of the Department of Media and Culture Studies and Journalism at Olomouc’s Palacký University) will present the book and discuss Tigrid’s work and life with other guests. 

Speakers: Jindřich Jůzl of publishers Odeon, Anna Rezková Horáčková of Paseka and Petr Januš of Rubato. Translators will be represented by German Studies expert Tereza Semotamová.

Chaired by Hispanic Studies expert Blanka Stárková.

Julius Varga got extremely sick at the age of nine after being inoculated against jaundice and became bedbound. Despite this he set out to take on not just his serious illness (the regime forbade his family from travelling to Switzerland for treatment) but also the totalitarian system. He converted to Christianity and began studying theology and philosophy. The Varga apartment in Šumperk became a gathering place for dissidents, former political prisoners and intellectuals, and among those who visited the charismatic Julek were Dominik Duka, Josef Zvěřina, Oto Mádr and Václav Malý. Soon the State Security began to monitor Julius Varga, setting up the “Julek” file on him in the spring of 1989. Shortly after the revolution in 1989 Julek got to see foreign doctors for the first time. However, by then his illness was too far advanced. He died at the age of 33.

Director Ondřej Elbel began working on a graphic novel about Julek four years ago. Designer Martin Jabůrek was doing the illustrations but died suddenly in February 2015. His friends Butula-Cichá, Chalánková, Estrada, Karpíšek and Matyska completed the work.

Organised by the Václav Havel Library in cooperation with the Větrné mlýny publishing house.

How do today’s youth view her legacy? What does Olga Havlová represent to them? Do today’s 20-year-olds have their “own” personalities they look up to? Who are their models? What do they think of non-profit organisations, volunteering and charity and how do they make that known? Do the terms that Olga Havlová and Václav Havel identified with – truth and love, compassion and humility – have the same meanings for them? And what do those who lived through the “Havel years” as adults make of the development of society and today’s youth?

Representatives of the young generation will discuss human and moral values together.

Organised by the Václav Havel Library in cooperation with the Committee of Good Will – Olga Havlová Foundation.

The French historian Annette Wieviorka will speak as part of a series of debates focused on the legacy of the year 1968 in the present-day context. Historians don’t choose their area of research by accident. This also applies to this French historian and specialist on the Shoah and the history of the Jews in the 20th century who, with admirable energy, studies the history of the genocide during WWII that devastated her entire family. As she explained in one interview, her enthusiasm for and interest in history was born in 1968. “Because only history can allow us to comprehend the world and gives us the possibility of changing it.”

The debate with Annette Wieviorka, who works at the Association Primo Levi and teaches at the university Paris-Nanterre, will be chaired by Luc Lévy, director of Prague’s French Institute.

Evening conducted in French; simultaneous interpretation provided

The debate series is co-organised by the VHL, the French Institute in Prague and the Institute for European Politics EUROPEUM. 

The 10 Commandments According to Dagmar is a staged reading of Dagmar Šimková’s book Byly jsme tam taky (We Were There Too). It is a very personal, internal, authentic testimony about the Communist prisons in which the author spent 14 years. Her recollections don’t lack either perspective or inspiring and appropriate firmness of opinion. She says far more about the period and the absurdity and monstrousness of the Communist regime than a few lines in a history textbook could.

The book has been transformed into a staged reading by Blanka Fišerová, who is also its only actor, and performances always retain an improvisational character. We get to hear not only excerpts from the book but also fragments of engaged poetic art and quotations from period documents.

The second in a series of three evenings will focus on telling the stories of two young people who have encountered mental illness in their lives. The discussion will focus on just anxiety disorders.

The evening will begin with a short introduction to everything that can come under the title anxiety disorder, the concrete forms that the illness can take, how it limits sufferers, how it influences their lives and what help is available to people with such difficulties. You will also learn how it is to speak openly about one’s illness at lectures or for instance workshops at secondary schools.

A series created by the non-profit Nevypusť duši (Don’t Let the Spirit Go), which is run by a team of young psychologists, neuroscientists and students of those disciplines. It also comprises psychiatric patients and people with experience of psychiatric illness at a young age. Nevypusť duši circulates information, busts myths and informs the Czech Republic about mental health.

It emphasises the importance of prevention and advises people how to keep their spirits up, shares personal stories and supports the timely obtaining of specialist help in the case of mental problems.

Klára Lampová and Martin Javůrka will speak.

Entrance only on the basis of prior registration. Forms are available here: goo.gl/VyURda