Jiří Křižan: The Shadow
- Where: Václav Havel Library, Ostrovní 13, Prague 110 00
- When: April 9, 2018, 19:00 – 21:00
Jiří Křižan’s novel Stín (The Shadow) is the powerfully autobiographical story of an orphaned country boy raised by his old-world, fair-minded grandfather interspersed with “half-witted” tales from alternative military service. It is a narrative that evokes an almost physical sense of what it is like to grow up on the margins of society as a stigmatised “class enemy” and second-class “former person” due to political tyranny.
Jiří Křižan (1941–2010) was one of the most distinctive Czech screenwriters of the second half of the 20th century (e.g., Shadows of a Hot Summer, 1977, dir. František Vláčil; Signum laudis 1980, dir. Martin Hollý; Sekal Has to Die, 1998, dir. Vladimír Michálek) and a leading representative of the pre-Velvet Revolution opposition (initiator of a January 1989 campaign to have Václav Havel released from jail, founding member of Civic Forum).
The author and his colourful life will be discussed by Karel Schwarzenberg and his daughters Rebeka Bartůňková and Barbora Křižanová.
The book’s editor Pavel Hájek will host the evening.