- Josef Jedlička
Josef Jedlička (1927–1990) was a Czech writer. Jedlička studied
aesthetics andethnography atPrague University , but after thecommunist revolution in 1948 he was kicked out of university for being an anticommunist. He then worked in various professions - as laborer, teacher, TV assistant, and tutor among them. After 1953 he moved toLitvínov , an industrial town in northernBohemia . Being an anticommunist, he was prohibited from publishing anything, but he wrote novels and short stories secretly and read them in circle of his close friends, among themJan Zábrana ,Bohumil Hrabal and other prohibited writers of the time.In 1966, after 18 years of prohibition, Jedlička was allowed to publish an experimental novel "Kde život náš je v půli se svou poutí" ("In the Midway of This Our Mortal Life"), written in the early 1950s; parts of this book were censored in this edition by the communist censors, the complete version would be published in 1994 after the fall of communist regime in Czechoslovakia. Nevertheless the book, with parts censored, caused scandal and was said to be antisocialist and once again Jedlička was prohibited from publishing. Only in 1968, was Jedlička allowed to publish few essays about
Kafka and Chaadaev in literature magazines. After theSoviet occupation of Czechoslovakia in August 1968, Jedlička was exiled toWest Germany . He eventually lived inMunich , where he worked as editor and commentator forRadio Free Europe during the 1970s and 1980s.Work
*Kde život náš je v půli se svou poutí ("In the Midway of This Our Mortal Life") written c. 1953, published (censored) Prague 1966, complete edition Prague 1994)
*Krev není voda ("Blood Is No Water"), novel (Prague 1991, German translation DVB 2004)
*České typy ("Bohemian Types"), essays about Bohemians and their culture, (Prague 1992)
*Rozptýleno v prostoru a čase ("Splittered Through Space and Time"), (Brno 2000), essays on literature, mainly written for Radio Free Europe, Munich
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