Jiří Stránský

He was released in 1960. In 1974, he was arrested again, charged with embezzlement and sentenced to another 3 to 5 years, but was released after one and a half. While imprisoned, he met with several Catholic writers, an experience that encouraged him to become a writer. After the fall of the communist regime, he was an author and head of the international section of the Czech Literary Fund. In 1992, he was elected President of the Czech section of International PEN. He was chairman of the council of the National Library from 1995 to 1998. He was a founding signatory of the Prague Declaration on European Conscience and Communism. His signature also appears on Charter 77.

• Name — Jiří Stránský • Born — 12 August 1931 • Birthplace — Prague, Czechoslovakia • Died — 29 May 2019 • Place of death — Prague, Czech Republic • Occupation — author, playwright, screenwriter, translator, • Notable Works — Štěstí, (Happiness) Zdivočelá země, (The land gone wild) Přelet, (Flight) Perlorodky, (Pearls) Tóny, (Tones) Balada o pilotovi,(Ballad of the pilot) • Children — 2 • Relatives — Antonie Formanová (granddaughter)

Stránský is a notable figure to the Czech public for his significant resistance and opposition to totalitarianism and injustices before 1989. Being creative as well, he has produced as a writer, screenwriter, playwright, poet and translator. Stránský has other achievements as a scout, as well. His stature in Czech society also has an origin in some of his family members, who were also prominent figures in the Czech lands. Stránský is the maternal grandson of Jan Malypetr, a once prominent Czech politician; the son of Karel Stránský, a lawyer; and also a relative of his father's cousin and the founder of Czech Scouts, Antonín Benjamin Svojsík, who has roots in the early years and forms of scouting. His immediate family—in particular, his father—also acted in resistance to the injustices of communism, which paired with his own, barred him from finishing school. Thus, in his life leading up to 1989 and the fall of Communism in Europe, he was falsely accused of vague criminal acts against the Communist state of Czechoslovakia (now the Czech Republic), and subsequently imprisoned for various lengths of time. Even so, following the fall of communism in 1989, Stránský found success and received many notable awards for his work as an artist and for his steadfast resistance to totalitarianism. Many of his popular works were also duly published widely made into film, television shows, and radio plays.

Like most Czech youth in Czechoslovakia, scouting and sokol made up a sizable amount of his life, like school. Since his ancestor was a notable founder of scouting in the Czech region, bringing the popular British form over, and his father played a notable role in their community's sokol as a mayor, Jiří valued his time spent being a part of these groups, citing the training he received in each as important skills in survival. While in the scouts, he was given the name, Jira. Jiří Stránský was active in other areas as well. At the pre-teen age of fourteen, Jiří banded with the May Uprising of 1945 to resist the current communist regime and was awarded the Distinction of Military Merit of the 2nd degree for being the youngest to engage in the coordinated defiance against the government. Whether attributed to his combatant actions or his family's, or rather their collective blatant refusal to align themselves with the popular ideologies of the government at the time, he was not permitted to finish school. As a result, he resorted to working various jobs. Then, at the age of twenty-one, he was falsely accused of espionage and eventually imprisoned.

Stránský cites his second imprisonment as the result of his activities at the Intellectual Gas Station being discovered. His arrest is the result of a bogus accusation of embezzlement. He is not sentenced until the following year, where he is to serve only two years.

After 1989, as he became a popular writer, playwright, screenwriter, poet and an artistic figure of merit and admiration, Stránský found himself regularly addressed as “Dr. Jiří Stránský” even though he never received a degree or completed school. Thus, at one of the Franz Kafka Society events he attended as a host (of which he is a jury member), he decided to correct this persistent mistake, and created the honorary degree of “Doctor of Prison Sciences,” or a PhD in Prison Sciences. He had reasoned that he is a certified expert in prisons after spending many years in some. As he explained, “Now, there is the intellectual elite of the nations here in these camps and prisons. And, really, this [his time there at prison] university lasted for over seven years. I listened to countless lectures on philosophy, aesthetics and other subjects.” Indeed, he made use of his time in prison by taking it all in at the wisdom of one of his colleagues in prison, Honza Zahradníček. Stránský recalls a time when he and other prisoners met to hear an art historian, who was also a prisoner (probably named Bonifalerský), discuss “aesthetics,” mentioning the works of Velasquez and other impressionists and artists from other movements. In order to share the material, Stránský and the other prisoners of this secret art history course “arranged […] with one of the civilian workers […] to buy […] postcards with reproduced paintings from the National Gallery [National Gallery Prague, Nárdoní Galerie Praha] {pages in each respective language} collection.”

„Byl jsem vychováván tak, že jedním z našich hesel bylo: Tu radost jim neuděláme. Přeloženo do normální češtiny: Nikomu, kdo nás ponižuje, neuděláme radost, že mu dáme najevo, že jsme ponižováni. Jiní říkají vznešeně: Neohnu se, nekleknu. Nám stačilo říct: Tu radost jim neuděláme.“ Translated, "I was raised so that one of our slogans was: We will not make them happy. Translated into normal language: We will not please anyone who humiliates us by showing him that we are humiliated. Others say nobly, 'I won't bend, I don't kneel'. We just had to say, 'We will not make them happy'."

• Za plotem, (Behind the Fence), written in prison (1953–1960), published 1999 • Štěstí, (Happiness), 1969, most copies were confiscated and destroyed by the communists, it was released in 1990 • Zdivočelá země, (The land gone wild), 1970, made into a film in 1997 • Aukce, (Auction), 1997, sequel Zdivočelé země, 1989 • Přelet, (Flight), 2001 • Povídačky pro moje slunce, (Stories for my sun), 2002 • Tichá pošta, (Silent post), 2002 • Povídačky pro Klárku, (Stories for Klara [his daughter]), 2004 • Perlorodky, (Pearls), 2005 • Srdcerváč, 2005 • Stařec a smrt, 2007 • Oblouk, 2009 • Tóny, (Tones) 2012 – novela • Balada o pilotovi, (Ballad of the pilot) 2013 – novela telling the story of Karel Balík, father of Stránský's wife • Štěstí napodruhé, 2019

• "Náhoda," 1976 • "Vánoce," ("Christmas"), 1976 • "Přelet," ("Flight"), 1976 • "Dopisy bez hranic," (Lasica and Stránský), 2010

• Latríny, 1972 • Labyrint, 1972 • Claudius a Gertruda, which premiered on 7 December 2007, theater association Kašpar, in theater in Celetné, directed by Jakub Špalek

Jiří Stránský is recorded as writer, linguist, translator, playwright and poet.