Sociologists Linda Sokačová and Marcela Linková, politician Marek Benda, university teacher Petr Pavlík and lawyer and politician Hana Marvanová will debate the issue.

Journalist Saša Uhlová will chair the debate.

The PLUH (Plough) agency, which represents Czech writers abroad, is celebrating 10 years of existence. In that period it has succeeded in publishing around 100 books in over 25 countries.

How to get ahead on the market? And does Czech literature have a chance in the world? Answers to these and similar questions will be provided during his lecture by the head of PLUH, Edgar de Bruin, who is a translator into Dutch and laureate of the Premia Bohemica Prize (2008).

Andrei Sannikov is a Belarusian dissident, former political prisoner and 2010 opposition presidential candidate. He has been granted political asylum in the UK and now lives in London. Sannikov is coming to the Czech Republic for the premiere of his play Flying Over the Rainbow. He and another nine imprisoned Belarusian dissidents were the addressees of a letter from Václav Havel in December 2011 that was the very last text Mr. Havel wrote before his death.

Ceremonial evening presenting two collections from the Václav Havel Library Notebooks series. Cenzurováno (Censored) comprises letters Zdeněk Neubauer sent to Václav Benda during his 1980–1983 imprisonment. Milý Radime (Dear Radim) is the first publicly accessible edition of a collection originally published on the occasion of Radim Palouš’s 70th birthday.

Several members of the Kampademie, a revived Platonic academy located on Prague’s Kampa, have promised to attend.

Ivan M. Havel will host the evening.

A dramatic composition of scenes from Václav Havel’s theatre plays on the subject of ménages à trois. Third-year students from the DAMU drama school will perform under the supervision of teacher Marie Málková.

A two-day international seminar in English on the spiritual legacy of Václav Havel and Jan Patočka, in cooperation with the Centre for Phenomenological Research / the Jan Patočka Archive.

Panel and follow up discussion will focus on questions such as:

What is president’s role in articulating of foreign policy?

What impact do the vague competencies between the president and the Ministry of Foreign affairs have on perception of Czech Republic abroad?

How does the current situation differ from the past?

What does the constitution say about responsibility for foreign policy making?

What role do presidents play in foreign policy in other countries?

Can the president interpret foreign policy on his own?

Chair: Jan Machacek- Respekt weekly

Entry is free of charge.

The debate will be simultaneously translated into English.

After 19 long years, prose writer Ludvík Němec returns to literature with these masterful short stories in which the heroes of unusual events often careen from edgy erotica to impending death…exciting reading! Igor Bareš will read from the book.

The Václav Havel library presents the voices, faces, poems and songs of the underground: Vít Kremlička, Beatrice Landovská, J. H. Krchovský, Pavel Zajíček, Dáša Vokatá and others.

The event is taking place as part of the 19th Book World Prague international book festival.

Screening of a film by the documentary maker Krystyna Krauz on the fate of the Crimean Tatars… Like all magical stories, it began in an ordinary way. A dream holiday in the Crimean, where we went to see the magical sea, beaches and vineyards and to enjoy the sun. Accommodation right by the sea seemed expensive to us, while the owners, Russians, weren’t likable. Somebody advised us to find accommodation in the interior, with Tatars…

Generational connections and shared starting points in terms of inspiration link Václav Havel to the Czechoslovak New Wave, and it is not widely known that he played a small role in one feature film. This VHL Film Marathon will present the young Václav Havel’s tiny acting performance as well as two pictures that represent the political and metaphorical currents present in Czech film in the 1960s.

Screenings:

Každý mladý muž (Every Young Man) (directed by P. Juráček, 1965, 83 min.)

Zahrada (The Garden) (directed by J. Švankmajer, 1968, 17 min.)

O slavnosti a hostech (A Report on the Party and the Guests) (directed by J. Němec, 1966, 68 min.)

Totalitarianism, post-totalitarianism or an authoritarian regime. A debate hosted by journalist and analyst Jan Macháček with Jiří Peňás, Ladislav Snopek, Anna Šabatová and Petruška Šustrová.

This Václav Havel Library discussion evening is being held in cooperation with the Slovak Institute in Prague.

A very special literary evening with Patrick Ouředník, the most translated contemporary Czech author, on the occasion of the publication of his new book by the Torst publishing house.

“Do you take part in festivals, presentations, readings?”

“Sporadically.”

“Why’s that?”

“Because I think that ideally they shouldn’t exist at all.”

From an interview with Patrik Ouředník by Matěj Petrů (Souvislosti 1/2012).

PLAV, a monthly dedicated to world literature, has been coming out for eight years now. This time it presents the mutually connected or completely unconnected literatures of the “Visegrád Four”. Texts by Ladislav Ballek, Péter Hunčík, Renata Putzlacher an Ádám Bodor will therefore be read in the course of the evening…

The evening’s hosts, PLAV editors Alexej Sevruk and Vratislav Kadlec, will pull back the veil over Visegrád.

Conference on the present state and future of European civilisation. The discussion panel will comprise Miroslav Bárta, Jeroným Klimeš, Jan Macháček and Václav Cílek. The conference is taking place in cooperation with Ace Academy.

Public debate on current affairs with editors from the weekly Respekt.

Opening of an exhibition by Michal Cihlář.

Michal Cihlář, an artist mainly known to the Czech public for his colour linocuts and photographs of a series of manhole covers, is showing his work at Galerie Montmartre.

The exhibition is taking place on the occasion of the publication of the monograph Ze života kanálů (From the Life of Sewers), the first title in the authorial series Detail v designu, design v detailu (Detail in Design, Design in Detail). The series, prepared by Michal Cihlář and Veronika Richterová, maps the subjects of their joint photography collections over the years and is issued by the Novela bohemica publishing house.

Early evening dedicated to the creative and moral legacy of the poet, author and political prisoner Jaromír Šavrda (1933–1988), including discussions, recollections, readings and screenings.

The event is being held by Ostrava’s PANT association, which operates the Moderní-Dějiny.cz (modern history) educational website, in cooperation with the Václav Havel Library.